MONTGOMERY COUNTY — The Ohio County Dog Wardens Association names the Montgomery County Animal Resource Center its agency of the year for 2020, after the agency has fought to rebuild its reputation the last few years.
“It’s terrific to be recognized for the good hard work we’ve made over the past couple of years so we’re very very proud,” said Robert Gruhl, the animal resource center’s director.
The award comes less than two years after Team Shelter USA found grounds for a criminal investigation under the former director’s leadership.
Before Gruhl took over, a Team Shelter USA Report found kennels were not regularly cleaned and animals were being euthanized due to inaccurate record keeping.
Gruhl said the agency’s primary focus right now is saving more animals and finding them loving homes.
“The essence of what we did was we worked really hard on managing intake, utilizing what we call RTO or return to owner, we’ve put a huge emphasis on that,” he told News Center 7′s Kayla Courvell.
Over the last two years, the center has focuses on retrieving the animal, remediating the animal and then reuniting or rehoming the animal.
The director also said they added new procedures to stay on the right path.
“Our internal doc review team, where we do team round and look at all the animals, our documentation has been through the roof, we use great documentation to market our animals,” Gruhl said. “We’ve increased communications with multiple partners in the area.”
Social media has also been a part of the agency’s evolution the last couple of years.
Gruhl said while they’ve made progress in rebuilding the reputation for the Animal Resource Center, there is still work to do with the county’s significant dog abandonment problem, which is not unlike other communities in the country.
The county is now working to launch a new foster care program this year, which will get dogs out of the shelter and put into a home, where they can recognize different behaviors. That will allow the agency to place dogs with the best possible family for their permanent home.
Cox Media Group
