Animal Care in Lake Forest - Moving Forward

Tonight the Council will consider staying with the County or moving forward with an alternative proposal for animal care. We’ve been looking at the staff report on “animal control’ and noted the general flaws as well as the flaws with economic consequence. We noted -

• · Failing to discuss the faulty data provided by OCAC (euthanasia rate, compliance) and what this implies for signing a 10 year contract with them.
• · Failing to discuss the reasons why so many cities left OCAC and Lake Forest is only one of two cities in Southern Orange County to remain with them.
• · Failing to recognize that there is a great deal of discontent with OCAC and pretending that 92% of the City is happy with the service.

• · Providing inaccurate information in a comparison between OCAC services and the Scope of Services being proposed, making it appear that the proposed scope does not address many issues addressed by the County.
• · Failing to include the possible defection of Huntington Beach from OCAC and the impact this would have on Lake Forest’s construction costs as well as operational costs.
• · Failing to discuss the impact of the defection of RSM and Laguna Hills on the operational costs of OCAC.
• · Failing to address the impact on operational costs of the promised improvements in staffing and training, and what this might mean to Lake Forest’s costs.
• · Failing to recognize that OCAC costs for Lake Forest have been steadily increasing at 2.5% per year while admissions are falling at 10% per year and field services are dropping at 7% per year, and what this costs inelasticity means going forward.
• · Failing to properly account for the licensing staffing needs given the experience in Mission Viejo and given our own abilities to use STARS personnel.

Putting all of this aside, where are we?

THE AGREEMENT

OCAC is asking cities that wish to continue to use their service to agendize the agreement with a staff recommendation to approve the agreement no later than May 31, 2016.

Interestingly enough, of the 3 cities who helped draft this agreement, one (Laguna Hills) has already defected and another (Garden Grove) is planning to defect. Of the 18 cities currently contracting with OCAC, only 2 (Anaheim, Cypress) have agreed to continue so far. Surely this tells us something!

The agreement requires us to spend at least $563,651 on construction, but we may pay $655,490 if Garden Grove defects and even more if Huntington Beach defects too. This money gives us no equity but simply is a “pay to play” fee.

On an operational basis, we are committed to paying OCAC whatever they charge us. There is no limit to high much we will be charged. We must stay with them for 10 years.

Cities may adopt fees even higher than the fees that OCAC now charges, which are the highest fees in California. Cities may also enact new ordinances if they wish.

Cities may pay additionally for services that OCAC will not provide, including “an animal behaviorist” and “a local Adoption Center”.

THE ALTERNATIVE

The alternative to the OCAC program would be to issue RFPs (Request for Proposals) to get organizations to provide

• · Animal control
• · Veterinary services
• · Shelter and Adoption services

The details are spelled out in the two “scope of services” that the ad hoc committee prepared and are included in the staff report. These scopes of services were supposed to have been inserted into the normal City contract language so that they were ready to go for the Council meeting, but for some unknown reason this was not done.

I argued for there to be 3 scopes, one for each element. Staff argued for only 2, with vet and shelter/adoption combined. But since I have been distributing these scopes of service as combined, I got a lot of feedback that it is cumbersome for these two groups to get together and make a single submission. It would be like getting the Police and the Fire authorities to submit a single contract because they often work together. While the Vet and the Shelter/Adoption Center will work together, turning them into one agency may restrict the number of applicants we will get. I’d rather separate them and have more to choose from, and then ask them to work together.

According to the staff report – “Staff believes the proposed draft scopes of services, with some additional refinement, provide a sufficient level of detail to enable interested parties to submit proposals….However, it is unknown whether the City would receive at least one or more proposals from qualified vendors with direct prior experience in managing or providing the breadth of animal care/animal control services stipulated in the Scopes of Service.”

I have personally been in touch with several Vets, animal control organizations, and rescue groups, so I am confident that the people and agencies are out there if we reach out to them. There are no guarantees, but the only way to find out is to try.

SOLUTION

1. Staff needs to create the complete RFPs ASAP. That means by the end of the week, or sooner.

2. The RFPs should be 3, not 2. This can be easily done since they were written so that they could be separated.

3. The return date for the RFPs should be May 16, but respondents should be allowed to submit sooner. This is a mere 3+ weeks but I have already been in touch with many groups, and the issue itself has been well publicized.

4. Staff can evaluate the RFPs between May 16 and May 23, including time to interview the respondents and visit locations (if needed).

5. Final arrangements and recommendations can be made between May 23 and May 26

6. Final report and recommendations posted on May 26.

7. Staff should schedule a special Council meeting for May 31, 2016 with a recommendation to approve the County plan. This should be the 2nd item on the agenda. The first item should be a review of the RFPs. If the RFPs are approved, the County plan can be avoided.

Bear in mind that the City has until September 2017 to put in place the services we need to make this program a success. That’s more than a year to work out the bugs. During this time we will probably experience further declines in admissions and field services as we tool up with our education programs.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Jim Gardner is on the City Council for Lake Forest. You can check him out on LinkedIn and/or Facebook and you can share your thoughts about the City at Lake Forest Town Square on Facebook. His comments are not meant to reflect official City Policy.

Dr. Gardner has office hours every Tuesday from 4 pm to 6 pm at the City Hall. In addition, he holds a Town Hall meeting every quarter. The next meeting will be on August 13 at 2 pm at the Foothill Ranch Public Library.