What happens to cats at Hamilton Animal Services?

Hamilton Animal Services (HAS), previously named Hamilton Animal Control (HAC) operates the publicly funded City Shelter/Pound. It's often confused with the privately funded HBSPCA. But these two organizations, while housed in the same building on Dartnall Rd., are completely independent and, with different mandates, function very differently. 

HAS, with a mandate to protect people from animals, takes in strays (sick, injured or aggressive), enforces animal by-laws (in response to complaints from the public) and operates a Lost & Found service. In recent years, many changes have been taking place at HAS that are affecting how these services are delivered. One of the things we (Rescue Hamilton Cats) have been doing is to stay informed about these changes, analyze data provided by HAS, and look into what these changes mean to Hamilton cats and the people wanting to help them. To provide a current picture of what HAS is doing (and what services they do and don't provide) we refer you to this report prepared midway through 2015:

What's Happening to Cats at HAS?
Mid-year 2015 Report Prepared by Rescue Hamilton Cats

At the 6 month (half way) point through 2015, a comparison of end-of-June 2015 stats with end-of-June 2014 stats was completed using data provided by Hamilton Animal Services (HAS). This report summarizes our analysis, provides graphs to illustrate trends and discusses how on-going changes at HAS are affecting Hamilton cats both inside and outside the City shelter. Read the full report