Yucca Valley Animal Shelter’s new leadership offers updates on operations, positive outcomes, and the road ahead

It’s been more or less a year since the Yucca Valley Animal Shelter became a popular topic at Town Council meetings. Starting in late winter of 2025 animal advocates came out in impressive numbers during the public comment portion of Yucca Valley municipal meetings and pushed for major changes in staffing and operations at the shelter. Some of these early meetings were nearly standing room only and would often erupt in an almost parliament-style chorus of “boos” and “hisses” at the mere mention of the former shelter manager that was accused of improper euthanasia practices and and shelter mismanagement.

The biweekly Town Council meetings are a lot more calm now, with a core group of animal shelter advocates still attending and speaking during those public comment portions of the meetings. There’s also a monthly standing committee meeting that was formed to allow a more informal back-and-forth conversation that isn’t allowed at Brown-Act regulated Town Council meetings.

The Animal Shelter shelter was on the agenda at the last Town Council meeting on Tuesday the 17th and recently hired Animal Care and Control Manager Shianne May presented the Town Council with some updates.

The Town has purchased software to help with managing the shelter’s intake and adoption records. It’s called ShelterLuv and Shelter Manager Shianne May is already familiar with it as she’s used it at two previous jobs. Dhe says it will improve reporting and data tracking and make communication easier with adopters and rescue groups. The shelter is also going to be creating its own Facebook and Instagram accounts for better social media outreach, and a donor recognition program is in the works to highlight past and current residents who have supported the shelter financially.

May reports that the shelter’s animal control officers are enrolled in Animal Control training certification training through the California Animal Welfare Association, or CalAnimals. She says that the shelter has made significant progress implementing the 32 recommendations from Town Council, but staffing shortages along with an over-capacity shelter have pushed some timelines back. 

“Continued challenges are affecting these timelines and daily operations, including staffing shortages, which is a truly an industry-wide issue. There is limited availability of professional services in our area and rescue group capacity constraints for those rescue groups that do help us out. These factors do all continue to impact overall shelter operations,” Shianne explained.

In Thursday’s Animal Care and Control Committee meeting, May expanded a bit on the reason for those staffing shortages. Animal shelters experience a high turnover rate due to job burnout from their animal control officers.

Despite the staffing challenges and operational upheavals at the shelter, the shelter does report live release rates in 2025 at 75.8% for dogs and 85.1% for cats – something that Town Manager Curtis Yakimow credited to community input, Town Council support, and what he says is “an incredible staff.”

That increased attention on the shelter and its mission is coming at a cost for taxpayers, however. The total operating expenses for the shelter’s last financial year were around $952,000, with a projected cost this year of $1.2 million. Town Manager Curtis Yakimow says a good portion of that increase is professional services costs as well as a shelter that is frequently overcrowded and operating at 150% of its capacity, resulting in a 40% operations cost-increase in a two year period.

Despite praise from the Town Staff and residents at the Town Council meeting, Shelter Manager Shianne May is still facing a vocal group of residents who want to see more access to spay & neuter clinics as well as a foster program and the most popular topic of all: volunteers. May says a volunteer program is coming, with a rollout of volunteer roles such as the shelter wades its way through the intricacies of municipal government processes.

At the end of the Animal Shelter’s department report at Tuesday’s Town Council meeting, there were public comments from a small but dedicated group of residents who more or less show up at every meeting. One year later, the Town Council meetings rarely reach the numbers they did last spring. The new shelter manager and positive staff reports have done a lot to calm many of the concerns that created those boos and hisses at earlier meetings. But residents like Susan Herring who have made it a habit to attend the biweekly meetings want the Yucca Valley Town Council to know that the shelter is now permanently on their radar.

During public comments, Susan simultaneously praised the shelter staff and the community on the changes that have happened over the last year. “I want to thank this community that’s come together over the past year and a half to stand before you hour after hour, month after month for a measly three minutes to tell you (Town Council) the horrendous stories of what went on at your Yucca Valley Shelter. Because of that, this past year, there are literally hundreds of dogs and cats that are alive today that went out your shelter alive to hopefully loving homes. Hopefully there’s no more ‘Howdys‘ in the backrooms.

“I hope when you don’t see an audience here in the future that you think we’ve gone away… because we are watching and we’ll continue to watch. And we will fully support Shianne and her wonderful employees… and we look forward to a better shelter. Thank you.”