The discussion over animal welfare at the Bibb County Commissioner's meeting Tuesday morning sparked concerns over the shelter's animal capacity and policy's on euthanasia.
"There are 80 kennels. It's not a continual take in," expressed Wendy Hilliard the Animal Protection Inspector for the Department of Agriculture.
County Commissioner Joe Allen threw his hands in the air and stormed out as talk of the necessity of euthanasia erupted.
When WMAZ's Judy Le caught up to him, Allen said he was "banned" from speaking about animal control anymore.
"I just can't talk to you about this right now," he explained.
He wouldn't say why, but he has previously publicly disagreed with the shelter's policy, saying they need to save more animals. That's hard to do when the shelter has reached its 80-animal cap.
"Monday through Friday last week and Monday yesterday, there were calls that totaled 269 dogs and 85 cats that we did not respond to because we're full," says Interim Director Deborah Biggs.
Attendants were divided over this issue.
"They can certainly be low-kill and they can certainly do a lot of things to improve their numbers, but as far as beign no-kill, they cannot do it," says Edwina Barnes, the Chair and Founder of Humane Services in Macon and Georgia.
Director of Central Georgia CARES Patti Jones says,"What we're seeing now is philosophy that was popular 20 and 30 years ago. That's not appropriate now."
"The reality is we have a shelter with limited capacity that's really even more limited than I thought at first," says Commissioner Lonzy Edwards.
Since Bibb County took over the shelter July 1st, there have been a few policy changes.
"When you put together a formula where you decrease the numbers of animals allowed into the shelter and increasing the adoption fee at the same time, that would result in fewer adoptions," says Jones.
The fee increased to $80, that's up $5 and required a $50 refundable deposit. Another big change is the open-door policy.
Former shelter head, Van VanDeWalker, told Eyewitness News that he resigned after the interim shelter director Deborah Biggs instituted an "open-door" policy allowing anyone to leave an animal.
VanDeWalker ran the shelter for part of this spring resigned Monday without warning, Bibb County spokesman Kevin Barrere said.
The commission first met privately to discuss a personnel issue. It is still unclear whether VanDeWalker was at the center of that discussion.