City of Bloomington Animal Care and Control

The Bloomington Animal Shelter is an Open Admissions shelter or Open Door Shelter, meaning we do not turn away ANY animal.

Many of the animals that enter our facility are healthy, good natured dogs, cats and rabbits (and sometimes other species)- that once become available for adoption, stay available for adoption without time limit of their stay. We also provide alternatives for animals that may require varying behavioral or medical needs. We have a very active volunteer based foster care program and in some cases may seek breed specific rescues to help place animals. There is, however, a much smaller number of animals that come to our shelter too sick, too severely injured, or too aggressive or behaviorally unsound to be adopted into our community. In this case, we believe that euthanasia is the most humane alternative to an existence of suffering and pain or being limited to a life in a cage.

While open admissions shelters like ours will give at least temporary refuge to ALL animals, many limited admission shelter- which sometimes call themselves “no-kill”- limit in various ways the animals that will receive admission. These decisions can be based on philosophies about the best allocation of their funds or in some cases, a moral objection to euthanasia.

The Bloomington Animal Shelter believes in helping the greatest number of animals with our available resources. It is not words or phrases that help animals but actual efforts, programs and initiatives. Simply turning a back on these animals and merely pronouncing that euthanasia should not exist won’t make euthanasia go away: tirelessly working toward more animal adoptions, further spay and neuter programs, animal rehabilitation and educating the public will reduce the necessity of animal euthanasia in our community.