All Kind Animal Initiative says goodbye to spay & neuter vouchers

ABILENE, Texas (KTAB/KRBC) — Rising costs are driving leadership at All Kind Animal Initiative to eliminate a popular program that was paired with its adoption services.

Recently, All Kind Animal Initiative announced that it will no longer offer spay and neuter vouchers when you adopt a pet from its organization. The announcement came in a social media post on May 1st that left many asking why. Executive Director for All Kind Animal Initiative, Kelly McCoy, spoke to some of the reasoning behind the decision.

“As everything in the economy is increasing in price, so is the cost of veterinary care. Those vouchers were no longer covering the full cost. It was just creating an extra step for members of the public and wasn’t actually saving them any money. So, to avoid confusion and to prevent them from having to go through an extra step, we decided to discontinue that program,” McCoy explained.

McCoy shared that their Community Cat Program, which involves catching stray cats and spaying or neutering them before returning them to their original locations, is seeing double the number of cases compared to last year. They explained that they hope to develop their organization to the point where they can regularly offer these procedures to the community.

“One of our major goals for the coming years is to be able to offer that low-cost spay and neuter for the public, not just for animals coming through the shelter system. Right now, we do that on a very limited basis, on a case-by-case basis. Identifying members in the public with the help of our animal outreach team who need those resources. But we hope to be able to do that on a more widespread basis,” McCoy shared.

McCoy went on to explain how they love working with their veterinary partners and still offer assistance to the public in locating affordable animal care for pets.