Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Arizona has made a change for the animals that sounds pretty good. He took over the animal shelter and is staffing with his prisoners. Maricopa County was spending approximately $18 million a year on stray animals. With his new program he is under $3 million. What he did was staff and operate the shelter with the prisoners. They feed and care for the strays. Each animal is walked twice a day. The prisoners are becoming experts in animal nutrition and behavior. They give classes for anyone who would like to adopt an animal. Sheriff Joe literally has taken stray dogs off the street, given them to the care of the prisoners, and had them place in dog shows. The prisoners get the benefit of about $0.28 an hour for working, but most work for free just to be out of their cells for the day. He pays the prisoners out of the adoption fees.

Then there is HSUS donating $500,000 to Dixon Correctional Institution in East Feliciana Parish town of Jackson, LA to build an emergency animal evacuation center and veterianarian clinic on the prison's grounds. This center was due to be open for hurrican season 2008. It is equipped to handling 300 to 500 animals picked up in the Baton
Rouge area. Inmate labor was authorized to build the center to save money. The care of the animals is to be incorporated into the rehabilitation program at Dixion and an inmate training program is being set up for training dogs to take care of special needs populations. It will also give student vets an opportunity to practice shelter medicine in non-emergency times.

I was wondering if there are any other examples of this type progressive resolutions to disaster responses and pet over population programs in any other state.

Bonnie...I am familiar with Sheriff Arpaio...he implements all kinds of practical cost saving measures, however, I did not know about this one. Thank you sharing.