Agenda Item 8BAGENDA ITEM # 813
MARCH 26, 2012
STAFF REPORT
City of Atlantic Beach
Commission Meeting
AGENDA ITEM: Animal Control
DATE: March 15, 2012
SUBMITTED BY: Michael D. ClasserChief of Police
BACKGROUND:
This is to follow up on the staff report presented at the February 15, 2012 commission
meeting and the ensuing commission discussion. The discussion centered around the
question of should the city fill the current Animal Control Officer (ACO) vacancy.
Additional items discussed included the appropriate level of Animal Control services for
the city, what assistance, if any, would the City of Jacksonville (COJ) provide, could any
efficiencies be gained by mutual aid agreements with the other beach cities and would
hiring a part time employee adequately resolve the reduction in force concerns.
It was documented in the first report that reducing the authorized Animal Control staff to
only one position would significantly cut previous service levels. There would be many
times when an ACO was not on duty, resulting in no response to the complaint except in
an incident involving an imminent danger to public safety. There would be far less
proactive patrols to a level of approximately 25% of the previous capabilities.
It would be expected that leash law compliance would dramatically decline while animal
control complaints would certainly increase. Other services such as animal trapping
would be very restricted or potentially eliminated entirely. The operation of the kennel
also becomes extremely problematic in caring for the animals 7 days a week. It was
already determined in the last report that outsourcing the kennel is not possible.
COJ was contacted about what assistance they could provide. They said that they would
make one weekly trip out here to pick up animals from our kennel, but only those animals
that we can legally sign over to them. In other words, those animals that have been held
and meet the minimum requirements listed in our City Ordinance. The Ordinance
requires a minimum of 3 days and not more than 7 days, except in a case of a bite when
proof of rabies is not provided, which increases the time to 10 days. COJ has provided
this service to Jacksonville Beach in the past and they experienced some problems with
coordinating the pickup with an on -duty ACO, available space in the truck or re-
scheduling if there were any conflicts.
COJ will not take AB animals which have not met the local holding requirement. In
addition, a once per week pick up would result in unnecessarily holding some animals
longer than required because they didn't meet the minimum for pick up and by the next
pick up will have exceeded the maximum. It would also result in overcrowding as the
AGENDA ITEM # 813
MARCH 26, 2012
kennel is a small facility only capable of housing a maximum of 6 dogs and 6 cats.
Further, it is COJ's position that they will not perform any animal control functions
without an interlocal agreement addressing several issues including ordinances, fees,
compensation, duties et. al.
As part of this follow up, the other beach city officials were contacted about mutual aid
or cooperative agreements relating to animal control services. Neptune Beach was not in
a position to provide additional help to Atlantic Beach due to the fact that service
requirements in AB would far exceed those in their city. It should be noted that Atlantic
Beach and Neptune Beach already provide mutual aid to each other in emergencies.
Jacksonville Beach has only one ACO, but is supplemented extensively by their large
corps of volunteers. The volunteers help with leash law enforcement and others with
kennel services. Even at that level of support they report that they were barely able to
scratch the surface on leash law violations and that dogs were often on the beach even
though they were prohibited during the daytime. They were unable to provide any
cooperative assistance to AB as they do not even have sufficient resources to respond to
matters in their own jurisdiction.
The question was also asked about the possibility of hiring only a part time ACO to cover
on the days the regular ACO is off. In theory, this could remedy most of the issues
addressed above. In practice, however, it may be much more difficult to find a qualified
ACO that is only seeking part time employment. In past position advertisements the
number of trained ACOs that applied has been very low. Hiring a part time untrained
ACO would carry with it some potential problems with training the new employee where
they would be qualified and capable of performing in a solo status.
In conclusion, the only assistance COJ will provide is a weekly pick up of animals that
we can legally surrender to them. AB has to make two trips downtown per week to
surrender animals. If COJ reduces that to only one trip for AB, it would save about 2
hours per week. Neither of the other beach cities is currently capable of providing
additional animal control services to Atlantic Beach. Therefore, the service cuts and
problems with kennel services summarized above remain unresolved if the vacant ACO
position is not filled. Filling the vacancy with a part time employee could address many
issues, but does come with some challenges as well. Based upon past experience, staff
would anticipate the likelihood of finding a qualified employee for the position to be
somewhat remote.
BUDGET: The expense for 2 full time Animal Control Officers is already included in the
FY 2012 budget.
RECOMMENDATIONS: Authorize the filling of the vacant ACO position.
ATTACHMENTS: None
REVIEWED BY CITY MAN R: