OAKLAND — Beyond a sign out front urging the public to “adopt today,” there is little that distinguishes the city’s animal shelter, a facility sandwiched between some rail tracks and a cluster of Fruitvale neighborhood homes.

On a given afternoon there, however, dogs and cats may arrive by the dozens to the shelter’s parking lot — a litter of puppies peering out from a truck bed, or a feral cat tucked into a bag with several newborns clinging to her chest.

The shelter’s officials are usually happy to take in these critters, but the combined number of newly dropped-off dogs and cats has risen by nearly 40% since 2019, a spike that has run parallel to staffing reductions at Oakland Animal Services due to the city’s budget woes.

New rules intended to cap the ever-rising intake numbers will allow the shelter, for the first time, to not accept animals whose owners say they can no longer care for them. Previously, the shelter was required to take in any surrendered animals, with almost no questions asked.

Pet owners now have 72 hours — down from a week — to claim their animal before it is slated for adoption or transferred. Certain dogs and cats over four months old must now be spayed or neutered before the shelter accepts them.

The current director of animal services, longtime city official Joe DeVries, said the new policies better align Oakland with state guidance for municipal shelters, following years without any revisions. He attributed the recent spike in intakes to the region’s larger housing crisis.

Dog foster manager Kay Martin grooms a terrier mix at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group) 

“People who have economic challenges are faced with this choice of, ‘Can I afford to pay for the care for this animal?’ ” he said in an interview this week.

Shelters everywhere have struggled with overcrowding, including in San Jose, where last year a scathing audit of the city’s animal services left advocates fuming, and in Contra Costa County, whose shelter already follows Oakland’s new policy of turning some animals away.

Following years of complaints, Oakland’s leaders removed the city’s animal services from the police department’s control in 2015, a bumpy transition for the shelter.

In general, though, government-run shelters and private rescues have run into the rising costs of veterinary care, another apparent factor behind the problem of widespread abandonment.

Much of that can be attributed to post-pandemic inflation, but animal advocates also lay blame on corporations — primarily, the candy company Mars, Inc. — that have bought up a large share of the country’s veterinary hospitals over the past two decades.

Spaying or neutering dogs and cats could cost as little as $200 before the pandemic, animal rescuers said. Now those procedures are regularly priced at $600 and, on certain occasions, at nearly twice that amount.

A kitten available for adoption looks on during adoption day at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group) 

“The surgeries haven’t changed, they just changed the pricing level,” said Pali Boucher, who founded Rocket Dog Rescue in San Francisco before opening a location in Oakland, where she resides. “It is such an insane price jump.”

There are some positive trends that track with the city’s animal services operating independently of the police — namely, the rate at which it euthanizes dogs, which fell from 17% in 2019 to just 5% last year. Nearly 9% of cats were put down.

Meanwhile, the shelter accepted over 3,500 dogs and 2,860 cats last year, adopting out 46% and 50% of them to the public, respectively, while transferring nearly 30% of dogs and 35% of cats to local rescues. Oakland Animal Services staff has declined by 30% since 2020.

DeVries said the new local rules, unanimously approved last month by the City Council, will make the shelter more efficient. Instead of having to immediately take in an animal surrendered by an owner, the shelter can now direct someone to an appointment system, allowing more flexibility around capacity.

At times, he said, the shelter has seen people turn up with animals from outside the city’s jurisdiction. In weirder cases, serial trappers have kidnapped their neighbors’ cats, pretending to bring in strays — only for the shelter’s staff to reunite pets and owners via the microchips in the animals’ collar tags.

Volunteer Karen Chuang takes selfies with a pit bull mix available for adoption during adoption day at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group) 

Still, animal advocates around town are incensed at the city’s staffing cuts. These new rules, they say, will lead to many more animals dying on the streets than in someone’s care.

“They are living, breathing beings, not cars that need to be towed or trash need be picked up,” said Nancy Safford, a longtime Oakland resident who frequently donates supplies to the shelter. “They deserve to be cared for.”

Neighborhood strays are a common sight around Oakland, often roaming the sidewalks or bunching up on the driveways outside homes, aware of a human inside who is willing to feed them. Under the new policies, someone bringing in a stray may be told to return a stray to where it had been found.

Control of dangerous animals, while rare, can be a stressful endeavor. A pit bull set to be euthanized last week after biting a child in East Oakland was instead stolen in the early morning from the shelter, and remains at large. A separate fatal mauling last year led the shelter to euthanize the three 100-lb dogs responsible, all of which had allegedly been left off leash.

Such dangerous encounters feed the common perception that not everyone should be allowed to own pets. It leads volunteers to be selective about who they approve for adoption.

Broadly speaking, however, shelter leaders caution against preemptively judging prospective pet parents, or, as one shelter director put it, “anybody that wants to throw up barriers to pet ownership.”

Rabbits available for adoption look on during adoption day at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group) 

“There’s this idea that ‘un-housed people should not have pets’ — and I disagree,” said Ben Winkleblack, who leads Contra Costa County’s animal services department. “They love those pets and care about them as well as a lot of people with homes.”

And sometimes, the pets do not need a home at all, with research indicating that so-called “community cats” can get on just fine without a permanent owner.

But a pair of four-month-old kittens, Crimson and Clover, seemed pleased enough on a recent afternoon to be leaving the shelter with their new owners, Daniel Fernandez and Rosario Murguia, who adopted the pair for just $20, with all their vaccinations covered.

“We just felt it was a good idea to get them from the shelter,” Fernandez said in an interview. “You can’t beat the price.”

Shomik Mukherjee is a reporter covering Oakland. Call or text him at 510-905-5495 or email him at [email protected]. 

Daniel Fernandez, left, and his wife, Rosario Murguia, of Oakland, open their arms to take home two kittens as volunteer Valerie Greene helps them with the delivery during adoption day at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group) 
Dogs available for adoption look on during adoption day at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group) 
Volunteer Karen Chuang, left, carries a dog available for adoption during adoption day at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group) 
Valerie Greene, second from right, shows kittens available for adoption to Rosario Murguia and her husband, Daniel Fernandez, of Oakland, before making their final decision during adoption day at Oakland Animal Services in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, July 31, 2025. After looking at several kittens, the couple adopted a pair of them. The Oakland animal shelter, which is running out of space, offers cats, dogs, rabbits, and other animals for adoption from Thursday to Sunday. (Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group)