***LACTATING MAMA WITH NO KITTENS AND A NEW HOPE RATING!!  Petunia is a stunning 2 year old who was brought into the ACC with no kittens, but with plenty of milk for a whole litter of them.  Those missing babies must be driving her frantic with worry, and being brought to the ACC as a stray will only have exacerbated her fears.  Petunia looks something like a wise owl in her photograph, and that wisdom is telling her everything that she does not want to hear.  This lovely cat knows that death is coming for her tomorrow, which is why a New Hope rescue must be found for her tonight.***  (written by ACC volunteer)

Every night, anywhere from 5-30 homeless dogs and cats are placed on "deathrow," which means they will be euthanized the following day if they are not adopted in the next 12-24 hours. The majority of the time, these animals are placed on this kill list due to them coming down with treatable sicknesses such as URIs and kennel cough that are common in shelter conditions. URIs (upper respiratory infections) and kennel cough are the equivalent of a dog or kitty catching the common cold!! They are highly treatable with antibiotics. Other times, these animals have become so afraid and stressed out by being in the shelter that they have begun to show signs of emotional wear and tear in the form of aggression, or discomfort being handled.

I decided to get involved after reading Petunia's story.  I reached out to other local animal shelters in the NY area to see if anyone could help her. I was surprised when I received a response back informing me that they couldn't help her because the kill-happy and money-hungry AC&C won't allow them to remove animals from the shelter:

Hi Nicole,

I'm sorry there's nothing we can do as all they want is money. They put down the animals all the time. We have tried years ago to pull some of their dogs and cats and we filled out all the paperwork they asked us to and then nothing. We have asked them why we can't pull the animals from them to save them they said they do not let the animals go to other shelters. We even tried a few more times after that to to pull animals and every time the same thing so we gave up.  We get so many people asking us to help the animals from there. The only thing we can guess is that they just want the money from people. I really don't think they care about the animals I think it's just money for them but there's nothing we can do here. I'm just hoping that one day people there can do something about it to stop it.  Thank you for asking us to help but like I said above I'm sorry since they will not let the animals go. 

Thank You, Chris

(Last name and Shelter name have been omitted to prevent retaliation)

So I decided to start a petition. People need to know about the AC&C's policies which are sentencing perfectly good dogs and cats to death every day, just so they can save a buck on needed medications, or make an extra buck on a last minute adoption.  Above is a picture of Petunia, the mama cat whose sad story made me finally say, "Enough is Enough!!!" She probably won't make it back to her kittens. But maybe her story can save thousands of others.