Kalyahna wrote:

(snip)

And they can't choose to take perfectly adoptable animals and still
leave the sick and less friendly animals for other shelters to deal
with? Their acceptance of cats from other shelters doesn't eliminate the cream-of-the-crop theory by any means.

Yes, it does. No-kill facilities and rescue groups "accept" (your own
word) the animals public and private kill shelters choose to release.
No-kill shelters and rescues take animals declined by public shelters,
animals scheduled to be destroyed. They don't walk past cages shopping
for the best and brightest and the shelter has no obligation to give
them the animals they want.

No-kills have fostering programs so when they are filled to capacity some of the cats are taken into private homes to be fostered.

Really? So do many euthanizing shelters, including mine. In fact, I
have a pair of brown tabbies in my bathroom. I just adopted a
long-term foster.

There are good and bad euthanizing shelters. The public shelter in San
Francisco has a kitten fostering program that is the envy of every
no-kill and rescue group in the area.

But please know that a shelter is only as good as its policies allow.
Some shelters will not support volunteers willing to foster neo-nates.
San Mateo county shelter euthanizes any kitten not eating on its own.
Other shelters draw the line at eyes open. Our SF shelter fosters
little ones no bigger than over-sized peanuts.

(snip)

Here's an example of how bad this winter has been. Admitting in our
building
has fifteen cages. We make sure that three are open every night for
incoming cats or rabbits from the humane officers. We had six open the other night.
Our doors open to the public at noon. By two in the afternoon, every
cage was filled, and there were five carriers on the floor.
For the vast majority of shelters, by the time we have any open cages, so do the other nearby shelters. We DO take in dogs from other
shelters, space permitting, including banned breeds from other cities.

The San Mateo county shelter has night-drop boxes, metal-doored,
cage-like lockboxes, kind of like a night deposit slot at the bank.
During kitten seasons, assholes drop litters of neo-nates into these
torture chambers. They're so tiny, they fall through the grates and, as
the mechanized cages retract, they're crushed. The shelter has not
bothered to modify the design of these nightdrops. I guess they figure
the kittens are dead meat anyway. Saves them the trouble of doing
intake paperwork.

Like I said, a shelter is only as good as its policies.