Research Seminar: Drivers of Outcomes in Animal Control Enforcement

Please join the Institute for Human-Animal Connection, in-person or virtually, for our spring quarter Research Seminar! This event will not be recorded.

Liana Moss and Kaleigh O'Reilly, researchers from IHAC's team, will present findings from their portfolio of research that aims to understand current U.S. animal control policies and practices. This portfolio includes qualitative and quantitative studies on how animal control engages with the communities they serve. Highlighting our first-of-its-kind study of over 1 million animal control cases with national representation, this seminar will highlight the inextricable intersection of animal control, access to veterinary care issues, systemic racial bias in differential enforcement, and the urgent need to address these disparities collectively as a field.

Learn more about our speakers:

Liana Moss, MSW, HAEI-SW, is a Research Associate II with the Institute for Human-Animal Connection at the University of Denver’s Graduate School of Social Work. She earned a Master of Social Work and a Human-Animal-Environment Interactions in Social Work (HAEI-SW) Certificate from the University of Denver in 2022. Most recently, Liana was the Keeping Families Together Implementation Coordinator with Human Animal Support Services and American Pets Alive!. In this role, she helped animal welfare organizations and communities across the U.S. and Canada access the tools they need to keep pets with their families. Previously, Liana was the Community Outreach Specialist with Pima Animal Care Center in Tucson, Arizona, where she worked with people experiencing homelessness and those facing extreme poverty to keep and care for their pets. In her current role, she engages in social science research at the intersection of animal welfare and social justice issues, contributing evidence-based findings that address historic, systemic inequities. The portfolio of research she manages focuses on topics including animal control law enforcement, access to veterinary care, cultural competence, and One Health/One Welfare.

Kaleigh O’Reilly, MSW, HAEI-SW, is a second-year Research Fellow with the Institute for Human-Animal Connection (IHAC) at the University of Denver Graduate School of Social Work. She earned her Master of Social Work Degree with a concentration in Ecological Justice, alongside certificates in Human-Animal-Environment Interactions in Social Work and Global Social Work practice from the University of Denver in 2023. Most recently, Kaleigh was a Mutual Aid Fellow with the Mutual Aid Collective at the University of Denver. In this role, she took part in critical analysis of social work systems and gained experience facilitating community-driven initiatives among unhoused and refugee populations. Previously, Kaleigh interned with Colorado Humane, supporting their Pet Assist program. In this role, she connected pets of community members in crisis to temporary fosters and conducted a program evaluation which provided recommendations for program improvement based on community feedback. She supports IHAC’s research projects that look critically at topics such as animal control enforcement, animal sheltering, and One Health in the context of access to veterinary care. Kaleigh approaches her work with the goal of contributing to building a regenerative future for all members of society by addressing historic and ongoing inequities with evidence-based research and solutions co-created in partnership with the communities they will be directly impacting.

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