BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — Kern County Animal Services received a $95,000 grant from the Petco Love Foundation to support life-saving programs.
- Video shows animals living in the Kern County Animal Shelter.
- For over two years, the Kern County Animal Shelter has an abundance of animals coming to their facility.
- The funding will support medical procedures, fostering and adoption programs, and spay and neuter offerings among other services to support pet owners to keep dogs and cats out of the shelter in the first place.
Orchards like this one in East Bakersfield are popular spots to find dumped pets around Kern County.
It’s been an ongoing issue, but on Tuesday the Kern County Board of Supervisors approved the receipt of the Petco Love Foundation grant to help give Animal Services more resources for life saving programs.
Dogs barking fills the Kern County Animal Shelter.
It’s the sound of a shelter at 300% capacity.
That's on average 14,500 dogs and cats a year, and about 40 animals a day, begging for a permanent home.
“What issues have you guys been seeing that this grant might help alleviate?” 23ABC asked Nick Cullen, the director of Kern County Animal Services.
“Just the amount of dogs that are coming to us," he said. "Which is more than we’ve seen in a very very long time.”
For over two years, the Kern County Animal Shelter has an abundance of animals coming to their facility.
Cullen names a lack of access to veterinary care and spay and neuter resources along with financial hardships for many pet owners as causes for the uptick.
“I think all of that is sort of the perfect storm really in the past three years,” Cullen said.
To help better care for these animals, Animal Services applied for the Petco Love Foundation Grant in July 2023 and received notification of the $95,000 award in late March to fund life-saving programs.
The grant will primarily support programs in areas like Oildale and East Bakersfield where Cullen says they find the most stray pets.
“It allows us to support the programs in whatever ways we see fit that saves the most lives,” Cullen adds.
While this grant doesn’t go directly to support abandoned pets countywide, it can indirectly help the work of organizations like Marley’s Mutts in Tehachapi.
“Predominately, what we try to do is go into the shelters and pull at risk dogs,” Connor Long, the operations manager of Marley's Mutts said.
Long says with additional funding to keep more animals alive in the shelters means there could be less at-risk animals for Marley’s Mutts to take to their ranch.
“If there’s not as many dogs at-risk, we’re not as under pressure to pull as many dogs as we do.”
The funding will support medical procedures, fostering and adoption programs, and spay and neuter offerings among other services to support pet owners to keep dogs and cats out of the shelter in the first place.
“We’re always willing to try to help our community when they are struggling with situations and circumstances that may contribute to them losing their animal,” Cullen said.
If you need help taking care of your pet, you can contact Kern County Animal Services for support.
We reached out to Supervisor David Couch's office to speak about the county's role in serving stray and dumped animals, but they declined to comment.
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