February 7, 2024 - Fort Wayne Animal Care and Control is the northeast’s largest open-access shelter. They are taking in more than 10,000 animals a year. Each day, FWACC strives to serve the community in a humane, public safety capacity while working to keep pets with loving families.
FWACC’s priority is to give each animal the proper care they need before they can enter our adoption program. To give each animal the best opportunity in life, FWACC uses its Angel Fund consistently. This fund helps create life-saving options for animals in their care, like Phoenix and Moses.
Phoenix was a lost cat who arrived in our care, trembling from the pain of burns that covered his entire body. He had a dedicated team behind him as he fought to get better. After going through surgery to remove any necrotic tissue on his wounds, amputate the tip of his injured tail, and be neutered, Phoenix was placed with one of our foster families who fell in love with him and decided to adopt him.
Fort Wayne Animal Care and Control is a municipal agency promoting a humane community. Petco Love’s investment allowed FWACC to add a contracted vet technician to their medical team, allowing the medical team to double their performance in surgeries.
2023 was a rough year; the intake of animals increased by approximately 10% from 2022, while the amount of adopted animals decreased by approximately 10%. The shelter turned to the community and its resources for help.
In April, Mayor Tom Henry proclaimed April as Safe and Humane Fort Wayne Month. Governor Holcomb proclaimed November 5th-12th as Adopt a Hoosier Shelter Pet Week. Both proclamations were to bring awareness to the public of pet homelessness and the overwhelming intake the shelter was facing. The city of Fort Wayne was encouraged and will continue to be encouraged to help the shelter by adopting, fostering, volunteering, and or donating.
Thanks to Better Cities for Pets A Mars Petcare Program, FWACC offered workshops to the community to help better understand their pets’ body language and behavior. The focus was to reduce animal bites, avoid euthanizing animals, and provide resources that create a safer community for citizens and pets.
We are your community shelter - here to help you and your pets. FWACC will continue to improve every year with the support of our community; together, we can help as many animals and pet owners as possible.
Visit ww.fwacc.org to learn more about Fort Wayne Animal Care & Control.
Animal Care 2023 Statistics:
- 11,127 animals (916 is wildlife) came to the shelter in 2023
- 1,708 animals returned to their owners.
- 1,569 animals surrendered to the shelter by their owners.
- 746 animals transferred to rescues/other shelters.
- 1,159 Community Cats returned to colonies.
- 2, 808 animals adopted.
- 1,224 animals sent to foster homes.
- 310 active foster families
- Recruited 80 new Foster Homes
- 13, 641 volunteer hours (over 1,000 more than in 2022)
- 138 active volunteers
- 611 animals euthanized at owner’s request
- $8,124.82 was raised through Give Greater Allen
- $10,621.91 was raised for FWACC through Fire Police City County FCU Strikes for Chairty
- $2,500 matching grant was received to go towards the Angel Fund, $11, 276,52 was raised during the month of February
- $50,000 grant from Petco Love
- The Journal Gazette awarded our shelter with a grant to purchase an official indoor dog playgroup enclosure
Community Outreach Data and Highlights from 2023:
- Animal Care Dispatchers answered 29,983 calls
- Animal Control Officers completed 22,236 total activities
- Investigated 9,144 cases – 3,150 of those investigations involved bites to a human or animal
- Rescued 6,415 strays from the streets.
- Animal Care Officers handed out 135 Spay-Neuter certificates to citizens
- 1,005 children participated in the shelter’s humane education programs (334 more than in 2022)
- Humane Education opened a second session of Read to the Animals to allow more students to participate
- 41.56% of pet owners who made appointments to surrender their pet decided to keep their pet or rehome outside of the shelter after receiving services through FWACC’s pet retention program.
- FWACC Adoption Center extended its hours by opening the first Saturday each month
- In the last four month of 2023, FWACC and Black Forest Cat Café facilitated kitten pop-up adoption