Riverton staff outline outreach plan for new animal shelter as intake remains low

Nate Slack, an animal-control supervisor, briefed the Riverton City Council on the city’s new animal shelter and outreach efforts, saying the facility currently houses only a handful of animals and staff are testing multiple ways to increase adoptions.

Slack said staff recently updated the shelter webpage to match city branding, added donation information and adoption links, and highlighted there are currently no volunteer slots open at the shelter. He also cited an unusual website engagement metric: “people are averaging 48 seconds on each page,” a signal Slack said shows visitors are spending more time on shelter listings than other city pages.

Slack said the city has struggled to engage some local rescue organizations: despite repeated outreach in the past year, “I’ve never received any feedback,” he told the council, noting unanswered calls and emails. At the same time, Slack credited volunteer photographers who post animals and connect them with potential adopters as a “lot of success” and said that program will resume in the coming weeks.

As next steps staff proposed several low-cost outreach tactics: featuring a shelter animal in the monthly newsletter (Slack said the first will be a yellow lab named Yeller who’s been at the shelter about four months), producing short videos that demonstrate how animals behave with children and other pets, and hosting an open-house adoption event at the new facility.

The council had no objection to the plans and thanked Slack for the update. No formal action or budget requests were made at the work session; staff said they will return if a funding decision is needed.