Riverside County Animal Services prepares for ‘Black Saturday’ free adoption event
Athena Jreij
THOUSAND PALMS, Calif. (KESQ) – Riverside County Animal Services is preparing for one of it’s biggest adoption events of the year, Black Saturday, giving free adoptions to all families.
All adoptions include age-appropriate vaccines, spay and neuter, microchip and ID tag engraving.
It comes as the county continues to face an overcrowding crisis at 200% overcapacity for dogs.
In 2024, over 80 animals were adopted on Black Saturday and more than 100 were in 2023.
As the county works toward a 90% live-release rate, officials say every life-saving effort counts and that many have shown progress.
“I just looked at some data just in the month of October and department-wide, we were able to get more than 400 animals out just by changing the shelter hours with a positive outcome than we had in previous months,” Kimberly Youngberg, the Assistant Director at RCDAS said.
News Channel 3 found steady improvement from May of 2025 to November, with month-to-date live-release rates increasing from 75% to 80% now.
However, a lot of work is still needed at more rural shelters like San Jacinto Animal Campus and Blythe, where a majority of euthanasias are performed.
Fostering, a key initiative to clearing kennel space, also improved from 1,761 placed pets in May to more 4,078 in November.
Youngberg says while they are still struggling to reach the 90% daily live-release rate, she’s confident the improvement will continue.
“Things are unpredictable with what comes in the door from any minute, day to day, and you know, all we can do is the best to make sure that we are doing everything on our side, to give us every possibility of reaching that 90% goal,” she said.
Black Saturday kicks off at all Riverside County animal shelters from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday.