Nassau County, FL – Dirty kennels, high infection rates and understaffing are just some of the claims, raised by former and current volunteers of Nassau County Animals Services shelter.
In a video shared with News4JAX from volunteers, dogs can be seen walking around in their feces.
In another, it showed several kennels with dogs next to urine.
Something current volunteer Kylie Champa said is not out of the ordinary.
“If volunteers aren’t going there to let these dogs out, they are not getting out for days at a time.”
Champa said her experience has not been the best at the facility recently, but she keeps going because she wants to make sure the animals there are taken care of properly.
And if you’re wondering why volunteers didn’t just clean the kennels instead of recording them, it’s because they wanted proof of what they’re calling horrible living conditions for animals.
Trinity Stokes, a former staff member who quit working at the shelter earlier this year, said people who held her position of Kennel Tech, were supposed to clean kennels multiple times a day.
However, that couldn’t always happen.
“As Kennel Techs, every 30 minutes you’re supposed to go through and do a scoop and mop, you have your sections and everything,” Stokes said. B”ut you have some kennel techs who wouldn’t follow through because they were busy with other things.”
The reason she said it couldn’t happen is because there wasn’t enough staff.
Monday, Lexus Harrison posted a message on social media, wanting to bring attention to conditions she said led to cats constantly getting upper respiratory infections.
Harrison volunteered at the shelter for a year.
However, her volunteerism was cut short Thursday when she was sent an email that stated she could no longer help out at the facility.
“I was devasted,” Harrison said. “This is what I do every single weekend, for the past year.”
The same day Harrison was let go from volunteering, is the same day the county replied to News4JAX’s emails asking about the facility.
In response to our question of dirty kennels they replied:
Yes, the cleaning of the kennels is adequate. Initial cleaning begins three hours of opening to the public. If necessary, the cleaning will continue until completed. Cleaning continues throughout the day and only ends when NCAS closes but resumes again the next morning.
Sabrina W. Robertson | Communications Officer Nassau County, FL|Board of County Commissioners
In response to our question about upper respiratory infections and outbreaks they replied:
NCAS does not have frequent outbreaks of parvo. Animals can develop an upper respiratory infection for a number of reasons; however they are immediately treated. The majority of animals that end up in shelters have medical issues when they arrive due to not being taken care of prior to entry into the shelter.
Sabrina W. Robertson | Communications Officer Nassau County, FL|Board of County Commissioners
“I just hope there’s some sort of change that happens and some sort of checks and balances are put into place,” Harrison said.
Because she said animals deserve to live better than this.
A group of volunteers current and former plan to meet at the Nassau County Board of Commissioners meeting this coming week, to talk about the living conditions for the animals.
News4JAX also reached out to the commission asking about volunteers being fired for posting on social media, we’re waiting for a reply back to that question.