Sims’ two-and-a-half-year tenure as ACS director was mired in controversy after a slew of headline-making dog attacks rocked San Antonio. Animal advocates have also criticized the department’s low live-release rate and blasted it for accidentally euthanizing of three dogs last summer that were not supposed to be put down.
Those controversies have led animal rights advocates to demand that the new ACS director come from outside the department.
Even so, two of the nine candidates that have made it out of the application process and into the in-person interview phase are current ACS employees, according to city documents obtained by the Current. Those two, selected from a total pool of 74 applicants, are ACS Assistant to the Director Shannon Oster-Gabrielson and ACS Chief Operations Officer Bethany Colonnese.
The remaining seven finalists for the leadership role are employed outside of the department.
Although internal hires are often considered a plus for companies and organizations due to their grasp of inner workings, animal advocates and other ACS critics are raising alarm bells at the city’s willingness to consider candidates from within the department.
“Everyone at ACS has been there too long, are too desensitized, have given up on innovative ideas and refuse to look outside the box,” Lea Laport, a founder of ACS watchdog group NoKillSA, told the Current last week.
On May 8, Laport and others protested outside of City Hall and spoke during council’s public comment session to demand that Oster-Gabrielson and Colonnese not be considered for the role.
During those comments, advocates alleged that both Oster-Gabrielson and Colonnese had past failures that should raise red flags. Advocates also argued there’s a conflict of interest in Assistant City Manager David McCary’s involvement in the hiring process.
City officials declined to be interviewed for this story, saying policy prohibits them from commenting on matters involving an open hiring process. Oster-Gabrielson and Colonnese didn't respond to the Current's request for comment.
McCary, San Antonio Solid Waste Management Director David Newman and Assistant Director of Parks and Recreation Melinda Cerda make up a panel that will conduct the in-person interviews for the role of ACS director, according to city documents.
In addition to overseeing ACS operations, Parks & Rec and Solid Waste Management also fall under McCary’s purview, according to the city’s website.
The conflict of interest, according to Laport and other critics, is that McCary essentially is Newman’s and Cerda’s boss.
“It is unclear how their expertise is an appropriate choice for determining qualities of a strong ACS director,” LaPort said. “And would you feel comfortable going against the choices of your boss?”
The controversy surrounding the two potential internal hires doesn’t stop there, however.
Using the Freedom of Information Act, advocates have obtained pages of text messages and emails that they argue demonstrate that both Oster-Gabrielson and Colonnese are unfit to take on the leadership role.
In the dog pound
Critics charge that Oster-Gabrielson in text and email messages to other department heads last summer questioned why ACS should have apologized for putting down three dogs that shouldn’t have been euthanized.
In August 2023, department personnel euthanized three dogs — Babe, Bandito, and Ollie — even though they were supposed to be released to rescue organizations. The deaths appear to have been the result of a breakdown in department communication, according to internal ACS documents obtained by the Current.
“The dog was on the euthanasia list and wasn’t pulled out of euthanasia after rescue placed a hold,” Sims wrote in an Aug. 21 text message to McCary. “Don’t want to call it accidental, but definitely a process breakdown in communication is what it looks like.”
Following the mistaken euthanasia of the three dogs over a two-week period, Sims called for an “operational pause” until ACS could figure what had happened, additional text messages show.
Although ACS ultimately took responsibility for the incident, two ACS officials — Oster-Gabrielson and City of San Antonio Senior Manager Analyst Brad Davenport — took issue with the department’s claim of responsibility.
“I just don’t like the angle of apologizing for what we do,” Davenport wrote in a text message to ACS Communications Director Lisa Norwood. “We will make mistakes, but not fair to take that blunt [sic] of responsibility on our staff for an error. We pay about the same as an admin assoc in most depts. It’s a flaw in the COSA system that is not okay.”
Meanwhile, Oster-Gabrielson wrote in a text that she didn’t “understand why we are apologizing for Babe.”
Animal advocates also argue internal communications suggest Oster-Gabrielson has displayed a lack of seriousness about legitimate critiques of the department.
During an Aug. 10 council meeting on the proposed city budget, District 7 Councilwoman Marina Alderete Gavito made clear her concerns with ACS’s prior performance and scrutinized parts of the department’s proposed spending for the upcoming fiscal year.
“I am concerned about some of this additional staff, like the five [Full Time Equivalents] for animal exams,” the councilwoman said. “I just feel that we need to focus the additional ACS budget for boots on the ground, for people responding to critical calls. So, when I see 14 positions on enhancing campus adoptions, on support service, on thriving work force — to me that’s not boots on the ground, and we really need to focus on boots on the ground so these dogs are getting picked up.”
Gavito’s concerns didn’t appear to sit right with Oster-Gabrielson or Davenport, who criticized the councilwoman in text messages they sent to each other.
“God David [McCary] sent us the audio transcript from Thursday. Unfortunately my memory is accurate and now I just had to relive it. District 7 wow,” Oster-Gabrielson wrote in a text to Davenport.
“They need to chill the fuck out. Jesus,” Davenport replied. “[Chief Marketing Officer’s] office are stressing everyone out, harshing my buzz.”
For context, Alderete Gavito has taken a keen interest in ACS and its internal operations, even touring its facilities Aug. 18, 2023.
Earlier this month, Alderete Gavito introduced a three-pronged proposal aimed at getting the city’s dangerous-dog problem under control. She called for stiffer penalties for owners whose dogs repeatedly wander off property, a system for anonymous reporting of dangerous dogs and allowing ACS to spay and neuter — at the owner’s expense — wandering dogs it picks up.
During an Aug. 15, 2023, council budget work session, Oster-Gabrielson and Davenport again leaned into council members in a group text with Sims. The trio discussed a meeting after the council work session, which it appears Sims was slated to attend.
“Good luck tonight with the old white dudes tonight. At least you’ll fit in. Maybe you can grab some beers with Perry later,” Oster-Gabrielson texted Sims, referring to then former District 10 Councilman Clayton Perry.
In another text message an hour later, Oster-Gabrielson targeted another council member, this time District 8’s Manny Pelaez, who’s now a mayoral candidate. In that text, Oster-Gabrielson discussed a hypothetical situation that might play out during a council session scheduled for two day later.
“Pelaez will go on a streak on [domestic violence] and cops and something we can’t follow,” Oster-Gabrielson texted Davenport.
No love from Petco
The other potential internal hire, ACS COO Colonnese, is also facing criticism from animal advocates, including one Austin-based consultant who worked with the department, for what they call her support for the department’s questionable euthanasia practices.
With ACS’s live-release rate at a seven-year low of 88% by the end of 2022, animal-welfare nonprofit Petco Love — created by retailer Petco — sponsored a shelter consultant to help ACS improve that number.
To that end, Petco Love CEO Susanne Kogut and Chelsea Staley, the nonprofit’s director of life saving, contracted Kristen Hassen, founder of Austin-based Outcomes for Pets Consulting, to evaluate and provide recommendations to ACS about boosting its live-release rate.
However, tensions arose between Colonnese, Staley and Hassen as the consultants tried to help increase the number of animals adopted out alive, according to a February 2023 letter written by Sims to San Antonio Assistant City Attorney Camila Kunau.
According to Sims’ version of events, Hassen visited ACS Dec. 7-8, 2022, and sent her findings to the department a few days later. However, Hassen told the Current that she was at ACS for four days.
Hassen also told the Current she identified a significant flaw in the department: that it focused primarily on moving animals out of its care as soon as possible instead of striving to prevent euthanasia of otherwise healthy and adoptable ones.
“By moving animals so quickly, animals that could have had a live outcome were not even able to have a chance at a live outcome other than the rescue-team list,” Hassen said. “Some of my recommendations would have potentially required additional actions to try to get the animals out alive versus euthanizing them, and I didn’t see a pathway forward with the client to make that happen.”
Of the 46 recommendations Hassen and Petco Love provided to ACS, the department only implemented half — 14 of which were already in place, according to Sims’ letter to Kunau.
Hassen said she doesn’t think Colonnese has adequate experience to become ACS director.
“I think for ACS to change — and it should change, and they could achieve more live outcomes,” Hassen said. “But that change is going to take demonstrated experience that is both a priority and something a leader can accomplish. I don’t know that Bethany [Colonnese] has that.”
Colonnese’s work experience prior to joining ACS in September 2012 was serving as the area director of Romano’s Macaroni Grill, according to the resume she submitted as part of her ACS director application.
What’s next
Petco Love’s Staley also applied for the ACS director’s position and made it to the final pool of nine candidates. She has the support of some animal advocates, who maintain that she would be able to shake things up at the department.
However, outgoing director Sims railed against Staley in his letter to the assistant city attorney, explaining why the department and Petco Love were no longer working with each other.
Sims met with Staley in January 2023 after an argument broke out between Outcomes for Pets behavioral consultants and Colonnese, according to his version of events outlined in his letter. Sims said the argument stemmed from the consultants attempting to house non-medically cleared animals with healthy animals.
Staley was unavailable for comment about the alleged conflict with Sims and ACS. However, Sims maintained in his letter to the assistant city attorney that Staley said that Colonnese, ACS’s live release manager and the department’s shelter manager “needed to go because they were toxic.”
The interviews for the nine finalists will begin May 31, ACS Advisory Board member Valerie Moore told the Current. Moore serves on the hiring panel.
The candidates will go through several interview panels made up of stakeholders, including rescue partners, executive city staff and other departments that may interact with ACS, McCary said during his presentation to the ACS Advisory Board on May 15.
City Manager Erik Walsh will make the final hiring decision, according to McCary.
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