Performance Management & Process Improvement Effort Documentation Form

Process / Activity: Animal control of stray cats
Purpose of the Process / Activity: Prevent a public health hazard to humans and animals (stray feral cats are known to become infected with rabies and other diseases, posing a danger to themselves, humans, and other wild and domestic animals); Prevent environmental and quality of life nuisances relating to stray feral cats (spraying, killing birds and other wildlife, digging up yards, etc.); Protect the health of cats, and prevent cats from being injured / killed by cars
Performance Indicators for this Process (and how each is tracked):
# / What are the key indicators of success for this activity? / How, when, and by whom is this indicator tracked?
1 / Adopt Policy and Plans / Policy and Plans are approved by Township Committee, October 2012, Health Officer
2 / Increase residents’ awareness of the information in the Responsible Pet Ownership policy through various health education approaches (indicator of success = increase the % of residents who report learning about pet ownership / stray cat issues / public spay-neuter clinics from Department-originated educational materials – flyers, emails, newspaper, etc.) / When residents contact the department about pets / stray cats or come to public spay/neuter clinics, staff will ask the public if they saw information (Flyers, email blasts, newspaper), starting October 2012 - ongoing, Health Officer and all staff.
3 / Increase the number of cats spayed/neutered by public spay/neuter programs (indicator of success = # of cats spayed/neutered goes up over time, although if program is effective enough at reducing the stray cat population, the number of cats needing this service may actually decrease at some point) / Health Officer will count spayed/neutered cats by working with the local animal shelter, Humane Society, and possibly hiring our own veterinarian (ongoing basis, as clinics are held, assess at least annually)
4 / Volume of code enforcement and complaints relating to stray cats (indicator of success = # of complaints and enforcement actions goes down over time, although public education may initially lead newly-aware residents to submit more cat-related complaints to dept) / Track by log book of summons and complaints, already in progress, Animal Control Officer and Health Officer (ongoing basis, assess at least annually)
Process Owner: Health Officer
Process Participants: Health Officer, Animal Control Officer, Health Education staff
Process first documented on: DATE 9/2/12 / Most recentlyreviewed & improved on: DATE 9/17/12
Briefly (2-3 sentences max for each) describe:
Lessons learned – What would you do differently? What didn’t work? / This project is just starting so no lessons were learned yet. This project may be a “Mission Impossible” but we are going to try and improve the current situation.
Promising Practices – What worked well for you? / Humane Society has mobile spay/neuter van. This type of program should be greatly expanded.
Estimated time/resources saved as a result of this improvement effort: / Unknown but we spend far too much time responding to stray feral cat problems. People repeatedly have to get rabies vaccinations because of stray cat bites and scratches.
The impact of this improvement effort on your department & customers: / We pick up about 50-80 dead cats per year. There would be less dead cats in the street and less resident complaints. Responsible cat ownership becomes the expected behavior of people.

Brought to you by the Local Performance Management Initiative