Back to finding homes for animals

By DAN BENSON

Ozaukee Press staff

Wisconsin Humane Society Ozaukee Campus in Saukville is open for adoptions again after a period of not accepting adoptions due to staffing issues, which have beset the organization in recent years.

But with a new hiring campaign, making some wage adjustments and instituting some retention measures, officials believe they have put those issues behind them.

“We’re very excited,” Humane Society spokeswoman Angela Speed said. “We temporarily closed for adoptions on Saturday, Sept. 24, because we were so short staffed. But we launched a hiring campaign and have some new staff members.”

The new measures allowed the organization to hire four new adoption counselors. It has a total staff of 15 to 20 people, Speed said.

The Saukville site continued to accept animals and put them out to foster homes as needed even though it was not accepting adoptions.

The Wisconsin Humane Society, which also has locations in Milwaukee, Green Bay, Racine and Door County has had periods of closure since Covid-19 struck in 2020 due to the pandemic and to staffing shortages.

Speed said that while it’s hard to predict whether there will be more closures in the future, “we’ve put some strategies in place for retention and we’re more confident that closures will be less likely moving forward.”

The Wisconsin Humane Society Ozaukee Campus, 630 W Dekora St., Saukville, is open from 1 to 5 p.m. on Fridays and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturdays. For more information, call (262) 377-7580.