Megan Navarro
KYLE — After trying to handle the operation of two campuses in Hays County, PAWS of Central Texas announced Friday, July 17, that it will be closing its Kyle location and dedicating its time and resources to its Dripping Springs facility.
PAWS has been operating in Kyle since 1986, serving as a no-kill shelter for Hays County, and opened its second campus in Dripping Springs in 2019.
The most recent news of the shelter closing the Kyle location also follows a similar announcement made last year, when PAWS took to social media to state that it would be temporarily shutting its doors Oct. 31, 2025, due to financial chanllenges. However, the community banded together at that time to raise more than $66,000 of the nonprofit’s $200,000 goal, as previously reported by the Hays Free Press, allowing the facility to stay open for a few additional months.
Now, according to shelter manager Kristen Weathers, the leadership team has made the decision to wind down day-to-day operations at the Kyle campus, for the same reason.
“It takes a lot to fund both campuses and the amount of monthly donations does not equal the amount of monthly costs,” Weathers said. “We kept it rolling as long as we could and we did as much fundraising and whatnot as we could, but we're just not covering it.”
With the staffing, medical expenses, keeping the surgery suite ready to go and ensuring that the animals have everything they need, it can cost approximately $100,000 to $110,000 per month to operate the campus, said the shelter manager.
To save the mission and remain a shelter for the community, PAWS is transitioning its full focus to the Dripping Springs location at this time. All of the cats have been transferred to the campus or to offsite locations and, as of July 20, there are 11 dogs still remaining in Kyle, but PAWS is slowly transferring them where they need to be, Weathers said.
“I think, overall, it will help us streamline a little bit. There are a lot of logistics bouncing between two shelters, whether getting foster animals dropped off, so they can make transport to come over for surgery and then, vice versa,” the shelter manager explained. “I think it will help us organize a bit more; hopefully, that'll help us be a bit more efficient.”
Weathers continued that she thinks the staff can still grow the adoptions program, as well as help with the feral cat community in offering spay and neuter.
Weathers shared that while they have “so many amazing donors on a recurring basis,” and knowing that it’s a big ask, PAWS would need to tap into some type of corporate sponsorship or individual donors who are capable of providing larger amounts for the Kyle campus to reopen again in the future.
“It’s not what we wanted to do. We tried. We did our best. We did a lot of work in Kyle, getting [the campus] cleaned up, revamped,” she concluded. “A lot of maintenance things were handled. A lot of infrastructure types of things. We really had the intent to keep everything going status quo, but it just didn't shake out that way.”
An effective date on when operations will close at PAWS’ Kyle campus is to be determined. The Dripping Springs campus is located at 2965 Farm to Market 165.
Those looking for more information on fostering, volunteering or donating to support the transition, can visit www.pawsshelter.org.
