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DASAB Agenda 10/16/2024Page 1 of 13 COLLIER COUNTY DOMESTIC ANIMAL SERVICES ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING October 16, 2024 6:00 p.m. Growth Management Community Development Department Room 609/610 2800 N. Horseshoe Dr. Naples, FL 34104 Laurie Harris, Chairman Kelly Hyland Michele Antonia Susan Mehas Sherry Rego (on Zoom) Jonathan Foerster, Humane Society Naples Allen Schantzen, Animal Rights Group Meredith McLean, Director Alexandra Casanova, Manager I. CALL TO ORDER II. ROLL CALL – QUORUM ESTABLISHED Motion to accept Sherry Rigo on Zoom was approved unanimously III. PEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE IV. APPROVAL OF AGENDA Allen motioned to approve the agenda Susan seconded Motion passed unanimously V. APPROVAL OF MINUTES August 21, 2024 Jonathan motioned to approve minutes at next meeting in November Susan seconded Motion passed unanimously VI. STAFF REPORT Meredith McLean • I just want to touch base on the September meeting notes. We did not get them until this morning, so we will get them over to you as quickly as possible. We know that that's taking longer than it should, so we have escalated that up the chain to make sure that does not happen again. And if it becomes an issue, we will go even further than that. • I apologize that those will be late as well. • I appreciate everybody's efforts in helping with the animals with that hurricane. And I assume partly the reason why the agenda didn't go out until Monday was hurricane related issues. But on the minutes. Yeah, if we can escalate that stuff because this seems to be becoming a habit with the minutes not getting out in time. • The August minutes weren't until the end of September. But yeah, if we could in the future make sure those announcements go out with the agenda a week ahead of time. Page 108 of 784 Page 2 of 13 • Thank you all for being here tonight. I'm going to start with the good things, even though I'm just highlighting what month are we in? We're in August, so I'm going to talk about September. But I do want to touch base on the storm a little bit because our staff did an excellent job kind of rising to the occasion, making sure that everybody was cared for and we were able to get out 78 animals as storm fosters, which if anybody was in that building when that was happening, the staff was running in circles. It was something new for. • I really want to commend them on their efforts to make sure that as many animals got out as they could. If something more major would have happened to the shelter, that would have been less animals for us to have to worry about. We were able to get some good stories on the animals that were in those homes. So that was a great. As much as storms are not great, that was really an awesome outcome from that. • We did have multiple staff members staying at the shelter this time to make sure if staff could not get into work, that there were staff on site to remain there and take care of the animals. We did have a transport that was scheduled the Tuesday, which was the day before the storm, but we were able to hop on an additional transport out of Sarasota on Saturday. We did make sure that we were not taking spots from areas that were more affected. Those areas were touch base first and they reached us out to us last minute. We organized that transport the day before, so we were able to send out additional animals. • During that week we transferred out close to 100 animals to either Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Chicago. So those were some good outcomes from the storm. If you haven't watched any videos on that, I recommend that you do that. So, to our animals, let's start with the other good things. For the month of September, we had 165 adoptions. • We currently have close to 130 animals in foster right now. Some of those remain for the storm foster, which is great because that means those animals are doing well in their homes. • We currently have 197 animals at the shelter. As for staffing, we have five full time positions open. That includes the veterinarian position. • I did check on that. We currently do not have any applicants. We're looking at additional ways to incentivize veterinarians to apply for that position outside of just being on the websites where they may look for those jobs. We are considering other possibilities there. We have the following positions open. • Manager • Vet Tech • Animal Care Specialist II • Foster Specific Coordinator • Customer Service • The program coordinator was very vague when it was posted, and we've taken it off the website and changing to a Foster Specific Coordinator because we know that that's how we can keep our animals moving in and out of the shelter. Also, when kitten season comes around, that's going to be a really important role to have. We want to get them in as soon as we can so we can combat kitten season because we all know that's when our numbers spike at the shelter. • Then we also have a Customer Service position open. We have quite a few applicants on almost all those positions outside of the veterinarian. We will be moving forward with interviews in the next month for those. Jonathan What is the salary for Veterinarian? Meredith It’s $150k to $180k. Jonathan What are seeing as the average salary in the market? Page 109 of 784 Page 3 of 13 Meredith • I think it depends on where we're looking, but I do see that slowly increasing with generally a smaller number of days worked. • I have made a recommendation for an increase of salary. It is something we're looking at now. • In the last three years because of no vet on staff, I think it's to the tune of a million dollars has gone out the door to other vets. So even if that salary's bumped to 250, we're still ahead of the game. I can only imagine it's the salary that's preventing people. • I mean, we all know Collier County is expensive to live, but the money walking out the door is tremendous. Jonathan I agree with you, but I think that there's also something to be said for not throwing money at it to solve the problem, but it doesn't necessarily give you a good solution to the problem. I think that if we are honest, part of the problem with the veterinary service that's happened at DAS over the last five years has been the vets that have been hired have not been qualified for the type of work that's being done in a shelter environment, which is a much different type of veterinary work than any other. And looking first for people with that specific skill set, it may require other incentives outside of just base compensation to make that work. Laurie I agree with you, but that position was open for 2 and a half years. Nobody wanted to take the job. Jonathan Being a shelter vet is a miserable experience. Laurie But as soon as we bumped the salary, we got candidates and that’s why I would expect we revisit the salary. Meredith • No, I agree. I will second the fact that shelter medicine is very specialized. I will say that universities are really focusing on shelter medicine now. Not every school, but a lot of schools are. But a lot of times when grad students or vets are just graduating, they don't necessarily want to work by themselves. • They want to work with other vets. So that's not an ideal candidate either. I did have them put the position in areas where people are specifically looking for shelter medicine. It's also attending conferences and stuff where we see those vets so that we can start talking about them. • Unfortunately, there is a reputation in the past, so we need to clean that reputation up a little bit too. I'm not saying it's specific to anybody that's there now, but that's something that I'm working on in just general conversations within the industry. I agree the salary will help, but I think we have some other things we must build on too. Kelly Does the Humane Society have a vet? Meredith They have 5 full time vets, I think. Kelly What is their salary? Meredith I don’t know. Kelly Do you know what media they used to hire them? Meredith Page 110 of 784 Page 4 of 13 • I will say prior that the vet positions were not listed on shelter vet specific websites such as animal welfare organizations such as HSUS or ASPCA. They have specific hiring categories for shelters. That was something that happened in the last few months that they did get moved over there some of those are also referrals from people moving into town and things like that. Jonathan They also have a full-service clinic that gives them a hiring advantage. Not every vet is going to have to work shelter medicine the whole time. They can share some of the burden that shelter medicine has that working as a regular vet doesn't have and splitting that among five people. While they do have one person now that's dedicated to shelter medicine, she has relief work, you know, helpers, other people there that can come in and do that work too. Kelly If DAS and Humane Society are now partners, why can't we get the help from Humane Society especially for spaying and neutering? With five vets over there and if this is this big partnership, I don't think any animals should be leaving Domestic Animal Services not spayed and neutered, especially any of the ones that are in the foster to adopt program. I can't imagine that we can't get the help here. Meredith • The partnership with HSN is something that Lauri was gonna bring up when we get into new business. But I will say they have many animals. • They also are full facing public veterinary clinic. They do quite a bit of work for us. We send animals over there almost daily for spay and neuter. If we need X rays, they do it in a heartbeat. They just can't physically send somebody over. • They currently have one vet out on maternity leave and one out on medical leave. They are short on vets themselves with the number of animals that they already must care for. But they step up pretty much anytime I ask them to, except for the weekends for the most part. They just can’t afford to send anyone over right now. Jonathan They're not taking new patients in their clinic either. They're booked out solid plus there are 100, 300 animals. However, many are in shelter there currently. Kelly Of the 100 that left are any of them coming back. Meredith Those were all transports. So those were transported to other nonprofits, mostly mainly nonprofit animal welfare organizations. They weren't all altered, but all those organizations will alter them before they're adopted. Kelly The 130 are foster to adopt animals and they are out because they're underage or they’re medical. Meredith • Some of them may be altered, but most of them are not because they're coming back into our custody before they get adopted. • We do have over 100 foster to adopt animals out right now. They're considered in foster. We're still in custody of those animals until they are altered. • They do fill out the adoption paperwork and when they do get altered, they are automatically adopted because they've already gone through the screening process. I know nobody loves the foster to adopt and if I could get every animal altered before it walked out the building, I certainly would. Page 111 of 784 Page 5 of 13 • But we do not have a veterinarian right now that does surgery and it's unfair to those animals if they have a loving home to go into that they sit there. That would leave us with absolutely no space to take in any kind of animals. • So should they not come back in, we can legally take that animal from them. Do we have to go through some steps to do it but for the most part I have people calling me saying, when can you get my animal in? They do want to get those animals altered. • We have set up significant spay and neuter days. I have PRR coming in tomorrow. We're scheduled with Gulf Coast Humane Society. We drive to Fort Myers to get those animals altered. We're going to start doing the weekend clinics which are most likely actually going to be held in HSN's facility because they have a DEA license to allow vets to come in and do those surgeries. • We're working with SNP in the new year to get them on the schedule. We really are doing what we can to make sure that those animals get altered, but also make sure that they're not Sitting in the shelter. Allen Welcome aboard, Madam Chairman. Regarding hiring a vet. The salary is one thing, but the other thing is the facility. Our clinic is in dire need of focus, and I know everybody's focusing there and it's going to be a capital item we go for. But the working conditions that we're trying to bring somebody into is a big issue. Meredith I agree. And getting some more technology like an Xray machine and things like that. Susan You are saying that we only have 197 animals in the shelter right not including fosters. If we added up 100 that went out the door, that's 297 and 100, that's 397. Last month we were at 524 total. That’s amazing. Let’s give the new director a hand. Meredith I will take the compliment, but I also want to extend that to my staff and the volunteers that are there daily making sure those animals get adopted. It is a team effort. Michele If a person has a foster to adopt animal and they didn't want to wait for you to neuter it, could they take it to their own vet and have a spade or neuter? Meredith They can do it and show us the paperwork. We won’t reimburse them though. Michele What provisions do you have If somebody has a foster to adopt and let's say they lose the animal, the animal runs out the door, you never find it. What do you do in a situation like that? Meredith We need to bulk up our foster packets when animals go home, but they are told that they need to report it to us right away, but I would absolutely return that animal to them. It can happen to any one of us here. If they don't report it to us, that's a little bit of a different story. I'm just talking about in general, like what do you do if you have a medical issue? We really want to make sure that we're addressing these things in our once-a-week staff training. up. It is an area of improvement that we need to work on. But we are coaching people, if you lose this animal, please call us right away so that we can be on the lookout for it. Michele Page 112 of 784 Page 6 of 13 Do you touch base with the fosters to adopt weekly or biweekly? Meredith We are only reaching out to them when we're ready to alter them. I will tell you our volunteers do a great job of staying in touch with our adopters when they can. If they need anything, we're working with them because legally, again, we are responsible for those animals. If they have a medical issue, they're reaching out to us. But for the most part, my philosophy is like, I don't want to harass people if they're doing a good job with their animal. It's not my job to stay on top of it. Now if they need things, that's different. If they need vaccines, we're reaching out to them. And then when we go to alter them, that's something that's important. But unless they need us, for the most part, I kind of let them be the owner. Just like we all are here for the most part. Jonathan Is there a tracking like sort of data point that you're using to say, all right, we're improving or we're not improving in terms of is it the number of animals in foster to adopt? Is it the length of stay in that position? What's the sort of metric that we're using to say we're making improvements? Meredith I've been just tracking how many animals we're getting out of the foster to adopt system. We probably need to look at more of those metrics. Susan How many dogs and how many cats? Meredith It's 127 cats and 69 dogs and one guinea pig. Kelly Have you had any fosters that had litters? Meredith I have not but we don’t send a male and a female home together. Even though they should technically be altered before they walk out the door, it is in there that they cannot have litters or resell the dog. Kelly How long the longest foster has been in foster? Meredith We are going back to the beginning of the year. We are scheduling spay/neuters starting with the longest fosters. Kelly Do you know how many are in the program from the beginning of the year? Meredith I don’t know but I can pull that and send it to you. Laurie I read the foster application, and I read the adoption application. Nowhere in here does it say you agree to the terms of you must bring the dog back, such and such. If you do not, the confiscation process will start. That's not written in here anywhere. Can that language be added and talk to the County Attorney about it? Because if you read it, it just says you’ve got a foster, or you have an adoption. Page 113 of 784 Page 7 of 13 Meredith • The foster application is written because those animals are legally still our custody. They can't tell us what we can and cannot do with our animals. That sounds harsh, but they are still technically our property. The adoption application is filled out, but it's not processed until they're altered. So, they are not legal custodians of that animal. • DAS has discretion. I mean, I'm happy to look at wording it so they understand that, but we have discretion as the owner, the rightful owner of those animals. • I think we can strengthen the language to say, you are responsible for bringing this animal back, and this is the chain that can happen if you don't. I can investigate how we can word that to be friendly but understandable. Kelly I don't know what the process is when they come in to take the animal, but a few weeks back when I was here, I witnessed a situation where there was someone that was taking the dog to the Foster to Adopt program and he had no idea that he had to get the dog fixed. He said, I don't need to be back. And they said you do need to be back because the dog needs to be altered. And he says, I really don't want to have to do that. And they said, no, you need to come back. You're not done here, and we will send you an email. And when you get the email, you need to come back. And he says, well, I really don't know if I want to do that. And they said, well, you need to. He wasn't willing to do that so, now someone left with a dog that's not altered. The system is broken. Susan She's been there six weeks and been through two hurricanes and dropped the numbers down almost 250 animals. I think we can all agree that what happened in the past is lousy. And that's why we're all here. That's why I'm here, is to impact change. That's why these gentlemen are involved, to impact change. You've told us the problem. What is the solution? Sherry (via Zoom) Is there a way we could put together a video for those that want to adopt in the foster to adopt, which would break it all down for them prior to them leaving the facility? They would sit in a room and watch this and then they sign papers. Meredith I like the idea. I’ll investigate it. Susan Is Harborside still helping you? Have you asked them? Meredith We haven’t used them for a while. I plan to build relationships in my role. Building 5 Report • There are delays on Building 5 because of the hurricane contractors that were with us with us needed to work on things within our community. • We should have the H Vac done within the next few weeks. • The roof repairs are complete. • Kennel repairs to the concrete walls are complete. The interior demo is complete. • We were waiting on some quotes on insulation and wire mesh in that building and we got one. • The flooring restoration was started this week as well. • So that's where we're at with Building 5. • completion date is estimated for end of year. Page 114 of 784 Page 8 of 13 • I don't know if we're necessarily going to move to Building 2 and 3 and 4 right away. Shelter architects are looking at it. • Should we look at other things, different styles and things like that? • The cats have been transferring and getting adopted and we have some new bunkers coming in. • We've been doing some trial rooms between our community cat program and just maybe some air for the animals. • We do not have a catio yet, but we do have two smaller rooms that we've been using as free roaming rooms for the cats and created a nursery specific for underage kittens and mom with kittens. Allen Madam Chair, one of the things we ask for is that in your staff report is that you give us a draft copy so that we can maybe preview our questions before you get to that and the data and specific numbers, we'd have in front of us. If I could remind you on that one. On the capital projects from, there are interesting improvements that are small but helpful like the awning going up over the water fountains. Is there a log, work order log of capital projects that are going on? If those things could be shared without a timeline you. Putting those items on that board that's in the hallway? Susan We are not putting the community cats out expecting them to fend for themselves. Meredith We have a TNR program. Susan But TNR cats are different than a friendly adoptable cat friend. Our cats should only be put back if there is a dedicated feeder and shelter. Meredith • We have a process which has not fully been signed and sealed yet about how we move cats through. If they're friendly, they automatically go. If they're truly feral and the party is willing to take them back, return to field, that's fine. It's those questionable gray areas that maybe are a little shut down when they come in. Are they able to be returned or can they turn into adoptable cats? • And we also have an age requirement for them to even be considered. If they're young kittens, they're not even being considered. They will stay with us. So, yes, and I'm happy to review that once it's signed and sealed. Kelly Can you give us an update on how many ACO’s we have and how many on the road and any community issues. Meredith I can get some updates from Code and present them at the next meeting. Allen I think this is a case where you invite Joe Mucha in. Meredith I can have him come as a guest speaker. Laurie Citations are being issued and nothing is done about it. I think that should be part of an update that we get every single meeting. I 'm sure they're paying their fines, I'm sure they're complying, but what is the process? Page 115 of 784 Page 9 of 13 Meredith Maybe we have Code come in at the next meeting so we can address these questions to them. Kelly I think that should be part of an update that we get every single meeting. Allen That would be an item on an agenda. Michele If they find a dog on the street, they're to look for the home where the dog belongs. If the dog is not spayed or neutered, are the people given a citation at that point or given a notification of some sort that they need to get that dog spayed or neutered? Meredith If they are returned to the owner in the field by an animal control officer and they are not altered, they are issued a notice to comply on not just alterations, but also rabies vaccines if they don't have it. Michele And what timeframe is the notice? Meredith I can get that answer for you. VII. OLD BUSINESS None VIII. NEW BUSINESS Laurie Meredith sent me the list with the stats showing prior years year over year by month. And with the no fee adoptions, it did skyrocket. Is that something for this Board? Since that would be a program or a service and that's our purview, I would think that that would be something that should come to this Board before it goes to the Commissions. Meredith I thought it was extended through the end of the year, but I will find out. Do you want Mr. French to speak on that? Mr. French This was brought up by the Commissioners. I give them briefings all the time on the construction and because the construction project is not going to be done before the end of the year Commissioner Hall, I believe, and Commissioner Saunders with Commissioner Hall brought it up and basically said, why don't we continue this until? You can go back and check the minutes, so don't quote me, continue it until the construction is done on five. Jonathan Is it possible to see a breakdown of the cost per animal per day or some generalization of that of dog, cat, whatever? I do think that that would influence the sort of adoption fee schedule. If I'm losing $50 every day you got a dog, wouldn't it make more sense to allow us to do more services? Mr. French Page 116 of 784 Page 10 of 13 Our basic facilities cost per square footage and what we looked at we were. And the food and the consumption, as far as our burn rate, we looked at somewhere between, depending upon the need of the animal, but it averaged out somewhere between 35 and $50 a day per dog. We didn’t look at the cats. Looking at that and you've got an adoption rate of let's say $80 for a puppy. Well, you keep the dog for two days, you're done. So, we must look at that as far as what our overall operational costs are and using. We use the third- party service to come in and talk about how we might be able to capture more dollars on the front end as well as reducing our operating costs. What's happened is that we're looking at that how can I reduce that animal stay. So even if it's a foster and it's out of there, there's still a cost associated to the general fund or to the taxpayers. We are looking at that. And we would bring that back to you to break that down. Alexandra Casanova My suggestion is. The Committee members should provide you, Laurie, the agenda items that they would like. Then, Laurie, you would be able to forward that to me just so we can consolidate all the items. Laurie I'm comfortable if everybody were to send their agenda items to Alex, consolidate, and then we can sit down and come up with one agenda. New subject. There was an article about the HSN partnership. It had administrative services and vet services. The question is, what was formalized? How was it formalized? What's in the contract? Meredith • I think the headline of that article was misleading. While I've been around, HSN and DAS have had a partnership in some capacity, whether it be transferring animals and providing medical care. The extent that HSN provides those services is way higher than anybody else that provides services to us. We have great relationships with organizations that come into our shelter. But it was due time to acknowledge the relationship between us because HSN has really stepped up in a big way, especially when we were at some of our lowest points. • It is true and I'm happy to share the numbers on that. So, the only formalized piece is, and it wasn't specific to HSN is when we went to the Board to extend the amount of money that we can pay for veterinary services outside of DAS to $850,000. That's public information that the Board agreed that we'd be able to have that because we knew HSN at that time was providing quite a bit of service for us. But that number was not exclusive to HSN. • I can use that at other veterinary providers. Also with the Resource X study, that was a Board priority for DAS to reach out and maintain and sustain those relationships. • In the last two years we transferred over 1,000 animals to HSN. And when you look at other areas within two years, the highest number that we transferred is around 200 to any other organization. • If there is an emergency and it's within operating hours of their business, I reach out to them and there hasn't been a time that they had told us no. It was to highlight all that they had done for DAS I just think the headline probably read a little incorrectly. I can pull numbers as a public records request on how much money we spend with HSN but I really just want to solidify the fact that we couldn't do what we do without their partnership. Allen Did this come about because we suspect something else is going on? Meredith • No, it just read as if there was a formal contract signed and there wasn't okay. • Regarding stray holds. This is more specific to dog because the rules around the cats are different, currently dogs are on a stray hold for five days. If you look at the first paperwork with the graph on it, I do want to explain because it may be misleading, but this is the average days to return animals. A few things you must take in consideration here is timeline. • If you look in October of 2022, that was when the Hurricane happened, that number is a little bit longer. Page 117 of 784 Page 11 of 13 • The other thing is the way this data pulls is when we were able to alter an animal before it walked out the door, they may have stayed an additional day with us because the outcome only happens when the animal physically left the building, not when the owner walked in and said, hey, that's my dog. • This is every animal agency in the State of Florida, but quite a few of them are some of the larger ones. Some organizations do a week hold for dogs. If you read through this, most of them are a five-day hold. We're pretty much on par with the rest of the State. Jonathan Is there a difference if a dog stays five days versus four days, are they more or less likely to be adopted or returned? Is there a length of stay change that like three days, we're putting them on the website for adoption. I remember way back that I adopted my first dog from DAS, they put them on there immediately and then said it's adoptable on this day and you could go put a hold in if you wanted that dog. Would we see dogs get our cats get adopted any faster if we change the length of the hold? I think the answer to that is probably no. And therefore, five days, seven days, what does it matter? Laurie I think 5 is a good number. Michele Isn't there a difference between stray and owner surrender? Meredith Any stray animal that walks in the door, we are taking. If they have a legal owner, we're working with them for solutions. I will say I do sometimes take owner surrenders based on the situation. IX. PUBLIC COMMENT Tom Kepp Verbatim transcript is available as an addendum. X. ADVISORY BOARD MEMBER COMMENTS Laurie Jonathan, welcome as a new member to the board. Welcome. Jonathan • Obviously, I come from a very specific point of view in that I'm the representative for Humane Society Naples and a former employee there. I was Meredith’s boss at one point, a long, long time ago. And so. But I think that there's so much opportunity for domestic animal services to continue the improvement that we've seen in the last five months, six months. It's been tremendous. • I'm hopeful to be here and be a part of whatever team that can be there to help support Meredith and the team there in making the necessary improvements. • Obviously, so much of it starts with the facilities that's outside of her control. We just must hope that we can help her be positioned to make the best use of those facilities once they're available to her. I think by talking about things it's a great discussion to talk about the fees, the fee structure. Right. • I'm on the opposite end of Susan. I think that zero fees are the way to go. I think that the fewer days we're there in the shelter, the more money we must spend on other dogs that need to. Or cats that need to go into the shelter. And sorry, I'm a dog person, Suzy. • I apologize in advance for defaulting to dogs. So, anyway, I'm just excited to be here. I'm grateful for everything and I hope anybody in. Any comment that I have made today has nothing to do with anybody personally whatsoever. I do believe in back-and-forth dialogue and in being the devil's advocate sometimes and in trying to find the right solution. Page 118 of 784 Page 12 of 13 • And I think that we can all be smart people and disagree on how we get there, but I think all our aim is the same, right? To make sure that this is the Best County in America for animals. So, thank you. Allen I'd like to see the thoughts you have about doing a proclamation of thanks to all the heroes that stepped up. I think it was like 71 or whatever that joined into the foster program, foster for the storm. And I'd like to find a way to give a kudos and a thank you to all those people that stepped up. Did DAS ever resolve its vehicle transport problem. Meredith We will be doing a proclamation on Tuesday at the Board meeting. If anybody would like to join us that would be great. We are going to reach out to some of the storm fosters to see if they would like to attend too. So that will be noted there. In terms of vehicle transportation, we do have a transit that is not a built in. We can stack crates and kennels in there. I don't know if there's any more additional slated but that has helped because it's not configured as an ACO van which limits what we can and cannot put in it. And I think I seen Ralphie go over the HSN the other day. Susan Jamie, I'm glad you're walking this way. The sign situation for the lost pets. I'm hoping we can come up with some something to help that group. I would like for somebody come to my corner of Pine Ridge and Airport on Saturday morning and look at all the political people that are there. They have signs and flags and poles stuck in all four medians which is a right of way. The signs for the lost animals should just stay out there. Mr. French • We're bound by both State and Federal DOT requirements as well as what we adopt locally, we call those in short snipe signs. They're drawn to get your attention while you're driving which makes an unsafe condition. Anybody who's holding a sign freedom of speech so long as they're not blocking passageway to allow pedestrians to walk through. Our County Attorney has weighed in on that as well as with the Sheriff's Office. If you remember Garrett Byron, he used to announce himself as the President of the Amalgamated Sign Holders Union which I think was a made-up title. But at any rate, we do have code enforcement staff that works nights and weekends that when we see these signs we take them down. • In that case we did our very best. We're very compassionate towards those people losing their dog. I know that I saw the sign. I went back to the kennel. Alex, who's there, he and I, we went through the kennel on a Saturday looking for that dog just in case. • I spoke with the ACOs that were on duty. Someone had perhaps spotted the dog with another dog. But still, whether it's yard sales, political signs, we buy used cars, those signs cannot remain. They're unlawful. It doesn't matter. Holding a sign that is different in the ground. • if you want a permit for a sign you should apply for a permit. Allen If you know somebody, we'd love to see Bella get adopted, but a foster will work too. She's here every day if you want to visit with her. Kenny, all his support comes from the group here in this building as far as the way the website looks and getting visibility, the way we're tracking data now. Meredith I didn't say this as part of the foster numbers, but we do have 20 dog, 19 dogs and one cat that are ambassadors, which are with our Collier County staff. Laurie Page 119 of 784 I must thank you all. This is my first meeting as Chairman. I thank you for your time, your patience, your help and I look forward to our next meeting, which is November 20th. Agenda wise, can we get the date for everyone to get their agenda items over to Alex? Yes, if we can get the agenda items to add to the agenda by the 1 lth. The agenda gets distributed that Friday, So I'm requesting by Monday. Jonathan I'll make a motion to adjoum 8:06 p.m. Laurie seconded Motion passed unanimously DOMESTIC ANIMAL SE S ADVISO COMMITTEE C an. Laurie or other These minutes were approved by the Committee or Chairman (choose one) of DOMESTIC ANIMAL S E RVIC ES AD V IS O RY C OMM ITTEE on \\as presented or as amended. Page 13 of 13 ,l Page 120 of 784