Our Impact
We serve more than 11,000 animals every year through sheltering, spay/neuter and wellness services, emergency food assistance, and various other programs. Our services & programs benefit animals and their people in any county, not just Vanderburgh County. In fact, in 2020, 35% of the animals we sheltered came from Warrick, Posey, Gibson, and other counties!
In 2020, we reached a live release rate* of 91% for the first time EVER! This places us within the industry standard "no-kill" benchmark of 90% or higher. Our amazing staff could not achieve goals like this without the support of our donors and volunteers! In 2021, we celebrated the most adoptions (3,431) and the most spay/neuter surgeries (7,073) EVER in VHS history. And ever since then, we have maintained a live release rate of 93% -- still maintaining "no-kill status!" (However, we do not use "no-kill" in our name or marketing. Click here to read about why.)
We are extremely proud of the progress we have made to improve the lives of animals in our community. In 1997, we took in 2,953 animals (comparable to our population now) but had to euthanize 1,250 of them. This placed us at a 58% live release rate*, or "save rate." While that is a sad number, it's an important part of our history to show how far we've come and how far the community has come. Each of our annual infographics since we began creating them in 2016 are available for download below.
Since that time, over the course of 20 years, we have improved the outcomes of local animals in shelters through the opening of our Spay & Neuter Clinic in 2007, robust adoption & foster care programs, and a wide range of humane education and assistance services. But there is still work to be done. Select "Get Involved" above to see how you can help continue our mission even further in the future.
Download 2024 Infographic [Updated]
*How we calculate Live Release Rate: Live Outcomes (Adoptions + Transferred Out + RTO) divided by Total Outcomes = Live Release Rate. This accounts for animals who were currently in inventory (with no outcome yet) on December 31st of each year.
Example: 2,408 Live Outcomes divided by 2,846 Total Outcomes = 84.6% live release
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