Katie Jarl

Katie Jarl is a life-long animal advocate and is currently the Executive Director of Texas Pets Alive! In that role, she successfully passed state laws in Texas to eliminate sales tax on pet adoptions and promote microchipping for pets. Prior to this, Katie worked at the Humane Society of the United States for more than a decade, serving as Regional Director over ten states guiding priority policy initiatives for the organization; and as the Texas State Director where she successfully worked to pass laws and increase enforcement on the issues of puppy mills, animal fighting, the shark fin trade, bestiality, animal cruelty, and exotic animal ownership and abuse.

She works with local city governments to pass meaningful ordinances to help animals, including an ordinance here in San Antonio to prohibit pet stores from selling puppy mill dogs. She previously served six years as Mayor Adler’s appointee to the Austin Animal Advisory Commission and is the current District 8 appointee to the San Antonio Animal Care Services Advisory Board. Most recently, she founded the San Antonio Animal Collaborative, a group of concerned citizens from across the city that advocate for common sense policy and programmatic solutions to the city's most pressing animal welfare issues.

Katie has managed on-the-ground responses to large-scale cruelty investigations and disaster response operations in Texas, including HSUS’ response to Hurricane Harvey. Katie is a proud Longhorn, having received her degree in Journalism from the University of Texas at Austin. She has been a Lavaca resident since 2017 where she lives with her husband and three dogs, Bella, Yuci and Pitufo.