Staycee Dains was a couple of month into her job overseeing the Los Angeles metropolis animal shelters when an worker brazenly defied her.
Dains requested the worker to scrub a kennel. As a substitute, the worker picked up a hose and sprayed a canine within the face, Dains stated.
Dains thought the worker ought to be fired, however she stated town’s personnel division really useful 5 days of depart.
Mayor Karen Bass employed Dains in June 2023 after promising to make L.A. “a nationwide mannequin for animal welfare” by turning round its troubled shelters, the place some canine stay in overcrowded and soiled kennels and volunteers have complained that animals typically don’t get meals and water.
However in an interview with The Occasions, Dains stated she felt powerless to resolve entrenched issues that included extreme understaffing and workers who mistreated or uncared for animals.
She stated she was repeatedly advised by the personnel division, which features like a human sources division at a personal firm, that she couldn’t fireplace downside workers. She additionally clashed with one of many unions that represents shelter workers.
At one level, Dains even reached out to L.A. County prosecutors for assist.
In the meantime, because the overcrowding worsened, extra canine and cats had been euthanized in metropolis shelters beneath her watch than within the previous years.
“We have to inform the unfiltered, unvarnished reality about what is going on within the shelters,” Dains stated.
In August, after slightly greater than a yr as Animal Companies basic supervisor, Dains went on paid depart. A number of days later, a prime Bass advisor advised Dains that her final day could be Nov. 30 and that she was free to resign earlier than then.
Zach Seidl, a Bass spokesperson, pushed again on Dains’ accusations.
“Many of those characterizations are deceptive and a few are simply plain inaccurate,” he stated in an e-mail.
Dains, in a sequence of interviews, stated town doesn’t present sufficient funding to fulfill the fundamental wants of the animals in its six shelters.
Throughout Bass’ first yr in workplace, amid important reporting by The Occasions and others about situations within the shelters, the mayor provided an 18% price range improve — far lower than the 56% the Animal Companies division had requested. The next fiscal yr, her price range proposal barely lowered the division’s funding.
Final week, in passing a price range that closed a virtually $1-billion shortfall, the Metropolis Council spared Animal Companies from main cuts.
Dains, who beforehand held prime shelter jobs in San José and Lengthy Seaside, stated her workers had been desensitized to the struggling of the animals after witnessing it day after day. The understaffing was so unhealthy that three individuals had been liable for 500 canine: cleansing kennels, establishing adoptions and dealing with the medical workforce, she stated.
“I couldn’t sleep figuring out that animals had been simply in these hellholes struggling,” stated Dains, who now works at a shelter system in Sacramento. “It was terrible.”
A canine accessible for adoption barks at Chesterfield Sq. South Los Angeles Animal Companies Middle on Aug. 31, 2024.
(Christina Home / Los Angeles Occasions)
Dains, who made about $273,000 a yr in L.A., stated she witnessed a few of her workers “terrorizing” canine by banging on their kennels, or spraying them with water to maneuver them again. She advised the workers to cease the habits, however some stated that they had been skilled to deal with the canine that means, she stated.
To make sure that animals had been fed and their enclosures cleaned, Dains instructed beginning a schedule that tracked when every job was completed. However a union consultant apprehensive that the data could possibly be used to punish workers, Dains stated.
Finally, Dains stated, she dropped the proposal due to the opposition from the union, Laborers’ Worldwide Union of North America Native 300. A consultant from the union declined to remark.
Dain stated that non-public entanglements and gossip amongst workers typically made it laborious to carry them accountable.
Some supervisors had had sexual relationships with their subordinates, which led them to miss the workers’ poor work efficiency, in keeping with Dains. Others used the “grime” that they had on co-workers to protest when confronted about their very own habits, she stated.
Dains stated she suspected that some workers had been sleeping throughout evening shifts as an alternative of cleansing cages or doing paperwork. She confirmed The Occasions a photograph of canine beds organized on the ground of a employees room like a “nest.”
She stated she additionally witnessed workers watching movies on their telephones, somewhat than working. Others ignored individuals who walked into the shelter trying to undertake a pet, she stated. Some workers advised her that colleagues failed to provide meals or water to cats and canine.
On the identical time, Dains stated, different workers went “above and past always” to make up for individuals who didn’t pull their weight.
“There’s a good portion of employees that simply aren’t doing their jobs,” she stated. “I noticed this always.”
Dains put among the blame on supervisors, who had been “not requiring them to carry out.”
When she tried to self-discipline supervisors, she confronted pushback, she stated.
After she put a supervisor on depart who was accused of bullying individuals, Laborers’ Worldwide Union of North America Native 300 filed a grievance towards her, Dains stated.
The personnel division declined to touch upon Dains. Spokesperson Bruce Whidden referred The Occasions to a metropolis regulation permitting basic managers to droop or discharge civil service workers, supplied it’s for trigger.
He stated the personnel division “gives HR assist in accordance with due course of ideas and any associated insurance policies.”
On the identical time, Dains acknowledged that she ought to have been more durable on among the assistant basic managers who reported on to her. However she stated she needed to keep up working relationships with them.
It’s a “difficult factor to do to begin writing up executive-level managers that you’re making an attempt to work with,” she stated.
A shelter worker, who requested anonymity as a result of he didn’t have permission to speak to the media, agreed with Dains’ evaluation.
“There’s no accountability, there’s no repercussions,” he stated. “And the employees who do work should work twice as laborious.”
A canine sits in a kennel at Chesterfield Sq. South Los Angeles Animal Companies Middle on Aug. 31, 2024.
(Christina Home / Los Angeles Occasions)
A report final yr by Finest Associates Animal Society, which highlighted the poor situations within the shelters and instructed doable options, criticized Dains because the “largest barrier” to enchancment.
The shelters lacked written protocols, and the euthanasia coverage “modified 5 occasions within the final yr” with out communication concerning the adjustments, the report stated.
In response to a Occasions evaluation, the variety of canine euthanized at metropolis shelters from January by means of September final yr elevated 72% in contrast with the identical interval the earlier yr. The variety of canine coming into the shelters elevated every year since 2022, however the quantity put to loss of life far outpaced the inhabitants acquire.
Within the crowded situations, animals began behaving poorly and suffered “psychological and emotional breakdown,” in keeping with the Finest Associates report. That made them much less prone to be adopted and extra prone to be euthanized.
Dains, in her interview with The Occasions, defended her euthanasia choices, arguing that it wasn’t secure for the animals, employees, volunteers or the general public to “warehouse” canine in kennels for months or years.
She stated that there was no euthanasia coverage when she arrived and that the division was creating one throughout her tenure.
Bass was Dains’ boss, however Dains’ predominant contact was Jacqueline Hamilton, deputy mayor of neighborhood companies. Dains stated she spoke typically with Hamilton and advised her concerning the personnel issues and different points. However Hamilton didn’t supply any significant assist and didn’t need her to publicize the poor situations on the shelters, Dains stated.
“I’m not getting any motion or traction,” Dains advised The Occasions, describing her work expertise.
Seidl, the Bass spokesperson, stated Dains “was given assist to succeed, together with help in speaking the standing of the division to the general public and resolution makers.”
Dains stated that shortly after she grew to become basic supervisor, she requested Deputy Dist. Atty. Kimberly Abourezk, who labored on animal cruelty circumstances, to ship a letter to the mayor about poor situations on the shelters.
Venusse D. Dunn, a spokesperson for the district lawyer’s workplace, stated Abourezk didn’t ship the letter as a result of she visited metropolis animal shelters and didn’t discover proof of any crimes.
The workplace “shouldn’t be ready to inform one other company the best way to function their facility,” Dunn stated.
Annette Ramirez, a longtime Animal Companies staffer, is now interim basic supervisor. The “extreme overcrowding disaster,” because the division described it in information launch this month, continues.
