Who Doesn’t Care About Puppers?!

I’m working in a library and a young couple comes up to me.

Couple: “We were driving by on our motorcycle and we heard a dog barking in your parking lot. We stopped to investigate and found a dog locked in a car in the sun with the windows barely cracked!”

Mind you, this is summer in Ohio, and we’re well over eighty degrees Fahrenheit. 

I investigate their claim and do find a small, very furry white dog barking its head off in the front of our lot in full sun. I go inside to find the manager on duty, but she’s nowhere to be found. I and all the other staff are very worried about this dog locked in a car.

I begin to discreetly ask around to the patrons currently in the library if they have a dog in their car. I find an old lady who admits to the dog being hers.

Me: “Ma’am, your dog is barking, other people have noticed, and you should probably go check on it.”

Woman: “Thank you. I’m surprised; [Dog] is usually so well behaved while I run errands.” 

She checks out her books and heads to her vehicle.

I watch from a secluded chair in the lobby, making sure she does go to the car and that the dog is still okay the whole time. The dog is fine, thank goodness. 

The manager on duty then reappears and notices me sitting in the lobby. She asks what happened, and I explain.

Manager: “It’s not our business. It doesn’t matter if a dog is trapped in a car or dies in our parking lot. We’re not to tattle to the police.”

I was shocked and contacted my immediate boss. My boss informed me that that’s basically “one opinion of one person in the library” and does not amount to our policies and procedures whatsoever. She also said I handled the situation properly and would not allow the manager on duty to get me into trouble over it.