Manhattan Animal Care and Control director Liz Keller checks in on a stray dog. Photo by Elva Ramirez

Jaded New Yorkers like to complain that true love is hard to find, and will occasionally sustain morose fantasies that they will die alone and unloved.

Unconditional love, however, is readily available, even for the commitment-phobic.

Every weekend, a mobile unit loaded with adoptable pets visits locations such as the Staten Island PETsMART. When it arrives, people are sometimes already in line for adoptions. Families are given pre-adoption questionnaires so that animal shelter workers have an idea of who will make the best match.

"We try to get as much information on the animal as possible," said Liz Keller, the director of East 110th Street Animal Care and Control shelter. Animal control workers track an animal’s history so that they can tell prospective families whether the sweet-looking terrier is already trained or if a chocolate Labrador with soulful eyes doesn’t get on with cats.

"Sometimes they like cute," Keller said of people's initial attractions to pets. But people need to know the truth about a potential pet's temperament, she said. "Finding a permanent placement as opposed to a whim" is the shelter's aim, she said.

Last Saturday, the van went home nearly empty.

Outside in the shelter's lobby, Mimi, a three-month-old gray tiger-striped kitten waited patiently for her vaccinations. Mimi was cradled by Sister Beatrice Sanchez from St. Jerome's Catholic church in the Bronx.

Mimi was a late Christmas gift for the Rev. John Grange, Sanchez said in Spanish. The priest's longtime cat, Lucky, had died in October and he asked for a striped kitten. Sanchez and her co-workers looked in several places before finding Mimi at the East 110th Street shelter in January.

Sister Beatrice Sanchez from St. Jerome's in the Bronx cuddles Mimi, the church mascot. Photo by Elva Ramirez

"She is very mischievous," Sanchez said. "She loves to play a lot." Mimi sleeps in a cushioned chair in the rectory but she is typically a whizzing blur of energy. She is a mascot of the church and although she belongs to Grange, Mimi is fussed over by nuns, church secretaries, schoolteachers and children. "Everyone loves her," Sanchez said.

Each day, New York City Animal Care and Control shelters rescue over 120 animals, according to the agency's January newsletter. But the newsletter also had some surprising news: in 2004, New York City had the lowest rate of pet euthanasias seen in over a century. Animal Care and Control is moving to become the nation's first metropolitan no-kill shelter by 2008.

To do so, it has to continue its trend for adoptions. For 2004, dog adoptions were up 72 percent, cat adoptions were up 123 percent and other species adoptions were up 63 percent, according to New York City Animal Care and Control. In order to be adopted, all animals must be spayed or neutered; this is complicated when animals are too young or sick to undergo these procedures.

Nearly 10,000 dogs and cats were adopted at Animal Care and Control shelters in 2004. Located in all five boroughs, the shelters are open-admission, which means they take in all animals that come through their doors. But animals are supposed to stay no more than 72 hours if they are sick or too young. Healthy animals are usually given one week to find a home before being put to sleep or, if space permits, sent to a rescue program.

Short-term care is popular with animal lovers who cannot commit to pet relationships but want to help animals facing euthanasia.

New Hope is the agency’s foster care and rescue program. An increasingly popular pet option, New Hope appeals to would-be pet owners by having them look after kittens or dogs for just weeks at a time. Commitment-phobes might nurse a kitten with a cold or offer a quiet corner to a nursing cat and her babies. Even if they have to return the cats to the shelter at the end of the fostering, they have raised the chances of foster animals by giving them enough time to regain health. Even the director of the Manhattan shelter has taken a dog into foster care.

A kitten in the adoption wards meows for attention. Photo by Elva Ramirez

But foster care sometimes turns into adoptions, as temporary owners find themselves deep in puppy love. Foster parents usually end up keeping them. “It happens a lot,” Keller said with a knowing laugh. Like other foster owners, she adopted her foster Rottweiler, Ashley, earlier this year.

Keller has a deft hand at connecting people with the right pet. Last fall, she went through several prospects for Hatch, a muscular Rottweiler who had been left alone in an apartment for a week when his first owner evaded authorities.  Hatch had nearly starved to death, and still had some “food issues,” Keller said. Hatch is now in foster care at Glen Wild, Keller’s animal rescue agency in upstate New York. She is still looking for the right family for Hatch. Animals like Hatch are called “special needs placements” and require more care than usual in matching up the pets with new owners.

Upstairs, a frenetic young man in a pin-striped wool coat and a Quentin Tarantino-esque accent paced the cat adoption ward. He was looking for a cat for his girlfriend and couldn't decide between a purring black tabby or a friendly tuxedo tabby. Keller pointed him in the direction of a slinky tiger-striped cat.

The cage was opened and the cat leaped into the young man’s arms, nuzzling his cheek. He expressed guilt that he couldn't take them all home.

Keller left him upstairs, looking from cat to cat, trying to narrow his search down. “You never know what type of connection people will make,” she said.