L.A. council unanimously confirms new Animal Services head
The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday unanimously confirmed Brenda Barnette as general manager of the Department of Animal Services, the city’s municipal shelter system that Councilman Greig Smith described as “under siege for a long time.”
Barnette follows in the troubled path of two previous general managers. Her predecessor resigned under fire a year ago and the manager before him was fired by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.
Well aware of the devoted but fractious community of rescuers, volunteers and shelter staffers that she must work with, Barnette told council members: “What I would ask the entire community is to agree on only three things — that we need to save more animals’ lives in the shelter, that we need to spay and neuter more animals in our community and that we need to work to end the cruelty because that will make this a safer community for both the animals and the people.”
She has had to defend herself against criticism of her previous involvement in dog breeding — anathema to animal welfare advocates trying desperately to adopt out homeless animals.
Barnette told council members that she had once bred a litter and had not shown dogs for several years. She has also resigned her membership in the Seattle Kennel Club. “I’m not breeding. I’m not planning on breeding,” she said. “My dogs are spayed — except one who’s neutered.”
Los Angeles requires all cats and dogs to be spayed or neutered. Asked about her past criticism of mandatory spay-neuter laws, Barnette said she believed that the current L.A. ordinance was unique. “My criticism of mandatory spay-neuter has been passing laws and then not giving the citizens a means to pay for them. And you have not done that here.... You have done things to make it possible and accessible for people to have spay-neuter. So I applaud that and I have every intention of supporting that 100%.”
Barnette was chief executive of the private Seattle Humane Society, which achieved a 92% live-release rate for animals in its shelter and did not kill any animals for space. But the Seattle Humane Society took in 6,937 cats and dogs last year. L.A. shelters took in 54,129 dogs.
Barnette said she thought it would take five years to get L.A. shelters to a point at which 85% of the animals that come into the shelters leave alive.
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
