From: jpk@Ingres.COM (Jon Krueger)
Subject: Re: Pet Population Legislation
Reply-To: jpk@Ingres.COM (Jon Krueger)
Organization: Ask Computer Systems Inc., Ingres Division, Alameda CA 94501
Date: 5 Oct 92 18:45:56 GMT

r hardin shares more of his theories:

> For the pound, it's a paid job.  There's no ``dog problem.''

Please tell that to the animal control officers.
They'll be delighted to learn that there's no problem.

> They keep the dog for three days not to adopt it out,
> but in case an owner misses it.

You're getting better, you almost got a fact right there.

An unlicensed stray dog isn't available for adoption for three
open shelter days.  A licensed stray dog for ten open shelter
days.  A dog released by owner is available immediately.  A
dog in protective custody isn't available.  Any dog that's
available for adoption is equally available.

These policies vary with locality.

> If you call it the city shelter, you'll get more dogs turned in
> by owners than if you call it the pound.  If you call it a humane
> society, you'll get LOTS more dogs turned in.

They're called different things for the handy reason that they are
different things and do different things.

The pound impounds dogs.  Unlike the shelter, it doesn't do education,
doesn't go into the schools, doesn't provide vaccination clinics,
doesn't investigate animal cruelty cases, doesn't get weekly columns
into the newspapers, doesn't promote public awareness of pet issues,
doesn't organize or promote dog training, doesn't organize or hold low
cost spay/neuter services, and doesn't have mandate or funding for pet
adoption.  The shelter does all that and more.  The humane society may
or may not have a shelter.  The humane society, unlike the pound, is
privately funded.  If the humane society has a shelter, it's usually
restricted from taking in strays.

Once again, perhaps your theories would improve if you got your
facts right.

> Let's do a diffential equation.   What the humane society workers
> would like is that every dog gets adopted, which means not that
> they have LOTS of storage space but that the demand for unwanted
> dogs equals the demand to get rid of unwanted dogs, so outgo
> equals inflow.

But perhaps your math would benefit even more if you got your
terms right.

"Demand for unwanted dogs" is a contradiction in terms.
Any dog that gets adopted is wanted.

"Demand to get rid of unwanted dogs" is simply meaningless.  I take it
you intended it to represent dogs arriving at the shelter.  It hadn't
occured to you that some of the dogs arriving are there because their
owners died, for instance.  Who exactly had the demand to get rid of
them, is, shall we say, unclear.

If you got a consistent and well defined set of terms, you could also
avoid the embarrassment of uttering things like:

> The inflow term doesn't depend on the supply of dogs but the
> willingness of owners to give their problem dog up

What the "problem dog"'s problem was when, for instance, the owner
died, or who in that case had more or less willingness to give the
"problem dog" up, is, to be charitable, again unclear.  Perhaps
"inflow term" and "outflow" term would be clear enough if you defined
them in terms of the facts.

-- Jon
--
Jon Krueger  jpk@ingres.com  
Newsgroups: rec.pets.dogs,tx.general