Greenhill Humane Society — Local services in Eugene

I’ve worked with greenhill 7+ years ago including adopting my cat and it was wonderful. I’m reviewing my experience that I had this year.

I foster and take care of many feral kittens and adults. (most special needs) I had 3 I need to rehome due to costs. (grain-free specialty diets get super spendy when you have a dozen special mouths to feed) I trapped, rehabilated, paid for the spay and neuter, vet care, and fostered 16+ kittens alone in Idaho before I moved to Oregon (There’s an awful feral cat problem there)

Greenhill’s 1st Avenue shelter doesn’t have cats anymore. I took the 40min drive out to the GreenHill location from my home to be not only turned away, but obviously their policies have changed? Or maybe it’s different now? I always thought animals were the first priority. It is a humane shelter after all, but I don’t feel it’s that way anymore.

Anyways, without even asking me questions or inquiring about what I wanted I was rushed out.

Apparently Greenhill doesn’t take ANY ferals from out-of-state, unless it’s considered owner-surrender. (Aka costs money but that’s ok with me) They also don’t even hand out information that’s readily available on the internet or even give time to explain your situation. I was handed a card with the greenhill number to leave a voicemail to set up an appointment and I was the only person in line. Apparently there is only ONE PERSON that takes in cats. Not only that, she’s gone right now for many days. Again, this is just an appointment to see if they were something they’d take in. Not actually the surrender! I was also told “the kittens I had weren’t feral because I could handle them”...ok then. I don’t know what that means, but trust me they were biting, scratching, alligator twisting, and bolted even if you made eye contact. I’ve worked hard to make sure they are ready for their forever homes. Greenhill isn’t it. Lol

I have no idea what would happen if I was in an emergency situation and needed to remove the cats from my home without waiting weeks on greenhill to get their ducks in order. Thank goodness I’m financially stable enough to foster for now. They have enough “dumping an animal is illegal” signs to make me wonder if their own policies make people do that. Definitely seems so.

What ever happened to taking the extra few mins to talk and give information? What happened to “I have $200 burning a hole in my pocket that I’m donating per cat to make sure they get what they need, so can we do it today or tomorrow”? What happened to “sorry we can’t, why not call Sarah’s treasures or another Pacific Northwest rescue and see if they’d take them sooner?”

I’m not shaming the person that helped me, but Greenhill in general. Making someone jump through hoops and multiple steps just to find homes for rescues/ferals is rediculous. What if I had just found them on the side of the road? I bet if I lied they’d take them. Guess honesty doesn’t get you far?

Long story short, called Sarah’s Treasures and they gave me some phone numbers to call, and lots of info on fostering. It only took maybe a couple mins tops. I highly recommend them. They definitely seem focused on the animals instead of the paperwork. I’ll happily foster my special babies until they get a good home through them.

Tips for Greenhill: Knowledge is power. Money talks too. I have both to throw at a humane shelter. I’ll be choosing a different one because of how difficult it is to surrender, foster, or even get info. Why take all the cats from the 1st ave location? I’ve been to many humane shelters that really try hard for the sake of the animals. I hope my constructive...

Just recently had a “lost“ cat show up at my property. Fairly good condition, healthy, very well socialized, litter box trained, crate trained, very pretty cat. Most likely somebody abandoned it– I get a lot of dumped cats at my rural location because there’s a turn out right by my house which apparently is a convenient place for people to pull over and dump cats. Over the 30 years at my location, I’ve lost count of how many unwanted cats have magically appeared on my doorstep.

Anyway, once I got the cat set up in a crate with food, water and a litterbox, I put a call into Green Hill to look into getting the cat into the adoption system. As I understand it, Greenhill Humane Society has been contracted by Lane county to deal with lost, abandoned, feral, and surrendered cats. There’s no more dealing with them at what was Tri-agency Animal control out on 1st Street in west Eugene. Green Hill is supposed to be taking care of it all.

No one was available to speak to me when I called, so I had to leave a voicemail. in my message, I carefully described what the cat was like in the condition it was in and that I already had two cats, so I didn’t really want another one myself but that the cat would be highly adoptable because it was both beautiful, friendly and well socialized.

The next day, someone calls me back and informed me that the cattery is “full” and that they couldn’t take it into the system. When I told them that I already had cats and it would be very difficult for me to keep the animal, they actually told me to just let the cat go, saying that cats are “very resourceful” and can survive in the wild. Basically they were telling me to re-dump the cat!

I was incredulous. I totally get that during the “kitten season“ any animal shelter is going to be overwhelmed with many animals to deal with. I understand. I’ve lived in this area for 40 years. Over those decades, from time to time, I’ve had dealings with Greenhill Humane Society. A few have been “OK”. But I am not going to lie, a lot of them were very negative. However, even the worst of those encounters, I NEVER had anyone at Greenhill ACTUALLY direct me to dump a cat back into the wild. Not ever. My response to the suggestion was, “I’m not sure whether this cat spayed or neutered cat (I hadn’t determined whether it was a male or female at that point) If I turn that cat loose and it’s an intact female, it’s going start producing kittens in short order!” Basically, their response conveyed an attitude of, “oh well.“

The person I spoke to did tell me that I could check back in a week or so and see if any room had opened up to put the cat in quarantine, but yeah, other than that there was nothing they were going to do for me or that cat. On top of that… • they didn’t offer to have me bring the cat in to be scanned for a microchip. • they did not ask me whether I might be willing foster it while they worked to get in into the adoption system.They made no suggestion whatsoever regarding ANY kind of fostering possibility AT ALL.

The whole experience has just left a really bad taste...

I will NEVER adopt from these people ever again. Last week, EWEB came out to do a meter reading and they left my gate open, which let my dog out. She was picked up by a good samaritan and dropped off at First Ave. Greenhill was terrible at communicating with me. First they said she was at the Wag Spay and Neuter clinic, gave me the wrong address, so by the time I figured out where she actually was they were closed. Night 1 without my dog. The next day I tried calling and emailing the manager of the main Greenhill location, JJ. He said she was at the main location, and that it would cost $18 to get her back because she didn't have tags (which is bull-she was licensed BY GREENHILL in March of this year and her tags were on her). I didn't have $18 due to the fact that I have a brain tumor and I have an astronomical amount of medical bills, so money is very tight for me right now. If they're licensed in the system replacement tags would only be $5. Then he told me in an email (which I have saved, by the way) that he would arrange for her to be transferred to the First Ave. location so that we could pick her up since the Greenhill Rd. location would be closed for 2 days. I didn't get off work until it was too late, and they wouldn't release her to me unless I paid up. So I had to scramble to get money and it was still too late anyway. Night 2 without my dog. The next day I call the first ave. shelter so I could go get her. SHE WASN'T THERE. JJ never arranged the transfer like he said he would. Luckily the lady I spoke to arranged it and my husband was able to get her-except now it was going to cost $30 in BOARDING FEES. Because of THEIR mistake. It wasn't even our fault she escaped, we explained our situation, but nope. So we took her home. Our gate ended up being broken because of EWEB, so guess what? She got out again. And was picked up by Greenhill. Except now they want to charge $100, because it's been too many times. Luckily I just got paid that day, but that's gas and food money for me that I gave up so I could get my dog back. What if I didn't have it? Would they just refuse to release my dog to me and deprive her of a family? These people are absolutely heartless. It's the holidays, I have a 4 year old AND a brain tumor, I have enough money to take care of the bare necessities for my family and pet and that's it. It makes me wonder what happens with other people in my situation. Do they keep the dog and just adopt it to someone else? They'd certainly make more money that way. They profit off of people by charging them extra for stuff like this. It's sickening. I'm not an irresponsible pet owner. I take care of my animals, and I've adopted them all from Greenhill, but never again. I hope the people at Greenhill see this. For shame, if they...