The affordability crisis in New York City has expanded its reach to a new and perhaps surprising corner of urban life: city animal shelters that are overwhelmed with pets whose owners could no longer afford to keep them.
Now, most people who bring in cats, dogs and other pets will be turned away, though the shelters will continue accepting animals that pose a threat to the public, need emergency medical care or are sent there by government agencies, the shelters said.
The tipping point came last week when Rocky, an older dog, was surrendered to Animal Care Centers of New York City, which runs the public animal shelters in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island, said Katy Hansen, the organization’s director of communications.
He became the 1,000th animal in the system.
“It’s nonstop and no one can keep up,” Ms. Hansen said in an interview on Sunday at the Queens facility, where animals were doubled up in some kennels and crates and the air was thick with the smell of urine and excrement. The sheer number of animals surrendered to the organization had left its employees unsure of what to do.
“ We can’t adopt our way out,” she said, as the earsplitting sound of barking seemed to echo off the walls. “I mean, unless we did a thousand adoptions this weekend, but that’s pretty unrealistic. So what is it that we can do? I don’t know. I think everyone’s trying to figure it out.”
Overcrowding at New York City’s animal shelters has been a long-term problem. Last summer, the city opened the Queens shelter at a cost of $75 million, but it was quickly overburdened with new arrivals that far outpaced its 72-dog-bed capacity. On Sunday, it was housing 169 dogs.
Many of the animals in the Queens shelter were given up by their owners. Ms. Hansen said about one-third of those were surrendered after their owners lost their housing or were forced to move into shelters or other places that did not allow pets. For other people, the cost of caring for an animal simply outpaced their ability to pay.
And there are other factors at play that are beyond the ability of animal rescuers to address. One is a pandemic-era dip in the rate of spaying and neutering in the city, which led to a population of puppies and kittens that are now growing into rambunctious dogs and cats in need of homes, Ms. Hansen said.
Another is the skyrocketing cost of veterinary care in recent years as private equity firms acquire and consolidate smaller medical practices, she said. All of that has created a perfect storm that is striking the shelter system just as the trade wars and political tensions have lurched the broader economy back and forth.
“Not everybody is surrendering their pet because they just don’t have time,” she said. “There’s a lot of people that are just, like, really struggling. And it’s sad. You know, they come in, they’re crying.”
“I think it’s just people are broke,” she added. “The wealth gap is hitting hard.”
There are two new animal shelters under construction, in the Bronx and Brooklyn, but they are not expected to open until next year, Ms. Hansen said.
That is of little help to Animal Care Centers in its present crisis: The organization’s shelters are caring for 382 dogs, 13 puppies, 383 cats, 163 kittens, 47 rabbits, 12 guinea pigs and several birds. There are also volunteers providing foster care in their homes for 290 more pets. One dog, Miss Missy, has been in an A.C.C. shelter for roughly 16 months.
On Sunday afternoon, several people lingered in the outdoor yard of the Queens shelter to meet some of the animals. Owen Marshall, 59, said he had not realized the shelters were in such dire need of people to adopt pets.
“ I had just been thinking about it, actually,” he said. “ I kept driving by here and said, ‘Well, let me just go in and see.’”
On Sunday, he adopted a 3-year-old brown-and-white tabby cat named Castin, who playfully bopped him on the head as soon as Mr. Marshall opened the door to his crate. Castin had been surrendered to the shelter in May.
Nearby, Les Barr, 63, was looking for a dog to bring home with him to Forest Hills. He came to the shelter on Sunday in part because he had heard on the news that the city’s shelter system was bursting at the seams.
He said he found that unsurprising, “especially now when people are having trouble putting food on the table for themselves, let alone for the four-legged guys.”
“ When the economy suffers, the dogs suffer,” Mr. Barr said. “ But look, you love the dog and you take it for better or worse, you know? It’s like anything else.”