Animal Services to Adopt New Bite Severity Scale

Dogs housed outside at the Austin Animal Center in 2023 due to overcrowding (photo by Jana Birchum)

The beleaguered Austin Animal Center, after years of overcrowding, mounting public scrutiny, and a scathing audit released in September, is asking City Council to institute a suite of changes – including one that may increase the number of animals euthanized. The audit found that AAC’s success at maintaining a no-kill policy has “come at the expense of animal care.” According to AAC itself, it may have also come at the expense of public safety for humans.

In a work session Tuesday, AAC staff informed Council that more and more dogs with known bite histories released from AAC go on to bite again, sometimes causing severe injuries. From 2017 to 2023, instances of severe bites as defined by the Texas Health and Safety Code increased from 68 to 131. AAC attributes the increase partially to the overcrowding issue: Many of these dogs become more aggressive the longer they stay at AAC due to shelter stress, and under current ordinances, AAC is required to make most of them available to adopt or foster.

One particularly shocking consequence of the status quo was highlighted by KXAN last week, in which a woman volunteering at a rescue last year was attacked and scalped by a dog that had previously been at AAC with a bite history. Under a proposed change, that dog may not have been allowed to be released.

Staff is recommending a change in the classification of bites. Currently, bites are ranked minor, moderate, or severe; the proposed change would use the nationally accepted Dunbar Dog Bite Scale, which has six levels of classification depending on various factors, with level one being aggressive behavior with no biting, and six being a bite that causes death. Under the new system, dogs with a bite history of level four or higher could be euthanized without being made available to the public.

Currently, AAC has to notify all partner organizations before it euthanizes animals with bite history (referred to as “the right to rescue”) – but if those organizations choose to take dogs with bite history before they’re euthanized, they are not required to disclose that bite history to potential adopters or fosters. AAC made clear in its presentation, however, that the “City is all in on ‘No Kill’ – Staff IS NOT recommending changing the 95% live outcome ratio mandate.”

Adoption of the bite scale would only apply to dogs that are the property of the city, and staff would still have to provide a public report rationalizing each euthanasia decision, as they do now. A dog that causes a level four bite is described in the Dunbar scale as having “insufficient bite inhibition and is very dangerous. Prognosis is poor because of the difficulty and danger of trying to teach bite inhibition to an adult hard-biting dog and because absolute owner-compliance is rare.”

In the work session, Mayor Kirk Watson recommended piloting the Dunbar change for six months to allow staff to be fully trained using the scale. CM Leslie Pool recommended amending the scale to include different classifications if a dog bites a child or an elderly person. Pool also recommended requiring that all partner organizations disclose bite history to adopters and fosters.

Aside from the Dunbar scale, the resolution also proposes changes designed to reduce overcrowding. Currently, dog intake has been restricted to emergency situations and sick and injured animals, cases of cruelty, and those that pose a risk to the community. Still, long stays are an issue: As of Jan. 4, 123 medium-to-large dogs have been at AAC for over 60 days, and 76 for over 100 days. AAC lacks sufficient space for medical care and is in violation of state code regarding its usage of kennels, cages, and pop-up crates, while the state auditor has pointed out that “crates are not ideal even for 1 dog, and we have many instances of multiple dogs in the same crate ... pop-up crates do not comply with the requirement that a dog be able to turn and stand freely without touching the sides of the enclosure,” according to AAC’s presentation.

To move dogs into the foster system faster, staff recommends doing away with the current requirement that an animal stay in the shelter for 72 hours before being adopted out. AAC has already instituted some changes recommended by the Council audit, including increasing volunteers and fosters by more than 50%, expanding spay and neuter programs, and starting the process of hiring a full-time IT person.

Ultimately, AAC’s building was not built with no-kill in mind – Council voted on that after the shelter was designed – so even with programmatic changes, a physical expansion is sorely needed. Whether that will be another full-service shelter or just an additional intake facility remains to be seen.