Built a lightweight Excel model that pulls 36 months of dispatch and intake, forecasts the next 12 weeks by day and patrol zone, and flags when projected kennel use crosses an 85% capacity threshold so you can adjust routing and on-call coverage. If you want the template or have predictors I should add (temperature highs, school calendar, community events), I’m happy to share and compare notes.
We saw loose-dog calls jump on neighborhood trash days; adding the sanitation pickup schedule plus NWS heat/wind alerts (https://api.weather.gov/alerts) tightened our 12-week forecast by zone. Small caveat: the “85% capacity” flag was too late for kennel turns, so we flip staffing at 80% during heat advisories — @OP, have you tried a weather-adjusted threshold?
I stopped treating 85% as one number — per‑enclosure thresholds work better. We cap large‑dog runs at 70% Fri–Mon because bite/quarantine holds stack, and I forecast outs off the municipal court docket; @OP want the docket field I add?
I got better staffing signals when I forecast kennel-days by intake type instead of just headcount — “kennel-days > dogs” — and I layer in sunset time (https://sunrise-sunset.org/api) because loose-dog calls spike right after dusk on youth sports nights; parks league calendars are surprisingly predictive. Small caveat: it makes 85% feel tight midweek when bite/quarantine releases cluster, so we bump coverage Tue–Wed — does your sheet track release days?