From: Everett Ives, BHANA
To: Tier 1
RE: My recent meeting with ACS Director Sims
Date: August 25, 2022
Today I met with Shannon Sims, the Director of Animal Care Services in San Antonio.
It was a constructive meeting and I learned several things that I believe are important to our communities:
· ACS suffered greatly during Covid and has been very successful lately in rebuilding its field staff;
· ACS has a $25 Million Hospital facility coming from bond funds that will greatly enhance their capacities;
· The Director is working with Non-Profits to provide for Spay/Neuter pop up clinics throughout our communities in the near future;
· I told him very frankly that his website sucks. They are in the process of redeveloping the website that will make it much easier to directly report animal issues and get access to needed information including documents, without going through 311;
· I told him that a Police Officer was frustrated that he could not reach someone at ACS on a weekday to escalate an issue in their agency. The Director told me that there is in fact a number for Police and he would work with Chief McManus to make sure the information is adequately distributed in the field.
· There is a shortage of 7,500 Veterinarians in the US and that has made it difficult for ACS.
I told the Director that this kind of good news needs to be communicated in the neighborhoods and that Tier 1 was uniquely positioned to assist. I promised to connect him with a leader at Tier 1 that would assist him.
I also told him that almost every neighborhood has some form of newsletter and is always looking for content. He said he has a Communications staff and he would arrange for them to put out a monthly article and circulate it to the editors. Tier 1 will be needed to assist with that as well.
I learned and I believe the communities need to know that Texas law only covers “Dangerous” animals that attack a human. San Antonio has passed a similar, municipal law that covers “Aggressive” animals that attack or kill another animal and under certain circumstances. This and the consequences of both of these can be explained in community meetings.
It was a very constructive meeting and I believe the current Director will make ACS a valuable asset for our communities.
One last, personal comment. About 5 years ago I started attending the ACS monthly Board Meetings with the intent to attack the department for its ineffectiveness. I discovered over the course of perhaps three meetings that ACS was not inept, they were (are) seriously underfunded for the expectations of the community. COSA has increased the ACS budget but not what I would call generously. Some of you may know that my “style” is to attack and dismantle my enemies but I now realize that ACS is actually doing a lot for the limited funding they have had and the “enemy” here is the limited budget that COSA has been allocating to ACS. I believe we can be very effective in helping ACS help our communities by impacting the COSA budget process to get ACS the staff, facilities, equipment and funding that is necessary to perform as our communities expect. I also believe the current Director is the right person for the job. He is an ex-Marine and his character is to go after tasks with gusto.
Contact Shannon.sims@sanantonio.gov