ACL Live at the Moody Theater
Spay/Neuter Laws Help Budgets
RECEIVED Wed., Aug. 4, 2010
Dear Editor,
Regarding the city of Austin's no-kill resolution: Austin and Lubbock are the only two large cities in Texas without a spay/neuter ordinance, and Lubbock expects to pass one this year. I guess if you live in one of Austin's nicer neighborhoods, it's no big deal if your public pool or your community center closes. You most likely have a good health care plan and you, your neighbors, or homeowners' association has a swimming pool. Shorter library hours just mean the kids in nicer neighborhoods spend more time on their wireless notebooks. Street crime may exist, but it isn't thriving on every street in your neighborhood. When the city's budget crunch hits a nicer neighborhood – the services that are cut due to lack of funding, well, there are alternatives, but in Austin's less fortunate neighborhoods, those budget crunches can be the difference between life and death. Public safety is a very real day-to-day issue. When our city leaders choose to fund an ever-increasing number of dog and cat adoptions over community programs, it really hurts our less fortunate neighborhoods. We need a mechanism in place to "fix" the problem on the supply end. The only other alternative is an ever-increasing cost to the taxpayer to fund an ever-increasing number of healthy, adoptable cats and dogs.
Regarding the city of Austin's no-kill resolution: Austin and Lubbock are the only two large cities in Texas without a spay/neuter ordinance, and Lubbock expects to pass one this year. I guess if you live in one of Austin's nicer neighborhoods, it's no big deal if your public pool or your community center closes. You most likely have a good health care plan and you, your neighbors, or homeowners' association has a swimming pool. Shorter library hours just mean the kids in nicer neighborhoods spend more time on their wireless notebooks. Street crime may exist, but it isn't thriving on every street in your neighborhood. When the city's budget crunch hits a nicer neighborhood – the services that are cut due to lack of funding, well, there are alternatives, but in Austin's less fortunate neighborhoods, those budget crunches can be the difference between life and death. Public safety is a very real day-to-day issue. When our city leaders choose to fund an ever-increasing number of dog and cat adoptions over community programs, it really hurts our less fortunate neighborhoods. We need a mechanism in place to "fix" the problem on the supply end. The only other alternative is an ever-increasing cost to the taxpayer to fund an ever-increasing number of healthy, adoptable cats and dogs.
Delwin Goss
