The Empire Strikes Back

FixAustin’s recent blog describes the “desperate last stand of Austin’s status quo,” a dishonest effort to undermine the recently enacted No Kill plan in Austin which has led to a significant increase in adoptions and a corresponding decline in killing at Town Lake Animal Center, Austin’s pound. The most recent salvo was fired this week when the Austin Humane Society announced that “No Kill” is responsible for killing kittens, a malicious and false claim that is contradicted by the facts: 48% more cats and kittens are being adopted and 59% more are going to rescue groups. In fact, Austin is safer now for kittens than it has been in its history.

The second salvo is expected to come later this week, and was put into motion during the last few months of Dorinda Pulliam’s tenure as the director of TLAC. Although the writing on the wall was clear—that the killing paradigm she embraced was coming to an end—Pulliam was not going down without a fight. And she enlisted the help of the ASPCA to do so. At the behest of Pulliam, the ASPCA has hired Dr. Sandra Newbury to do an assessment of TLAC. As much as Austin’s animal lovers want to forget Pulliam, it is hard to do so. Pulliam is the disgraced, forcibly-removed director who:

• Killed over 100,000 animals during her tenure, one animal every 12 minutes the shelter was open to the public;
• Did not want a foster care program, choosing to kill kittens and other animals instead;
• Killed despite empty cages (over 100 on any given day);
• Complained she and her staff did not have time to do adoptions because they were apparently busy killing the animals in the back; and,
• Allowed her staff veterinarian not to immunize animals on intake (and in some cases, at all), causing them to get severely sick;

After the City Council had had enough and voted unanimously to put a moratorium on killing healthy and treatable animals when there were empty cages available for them, she failed to provide care to sick cats causing them to suffer, and thus allow her and the ASPCA to falsely claim that No Kill equals hoarding. It was that final act that cost Pulliam her job, a loss that has meant a world of difference for the animals: Adoptions are increasing and deaths are declining.

Austin has never been safer for homeless dogs and cats than it is today. So why does the ASPCA appear intent on undermining that? After all, even if ASPCA leadership doesn’t care about the animals, they can (and mark my words, will) take credit for that success by claiming it was their dysfunctional “Mission: Orange” program that is responsible, even as they fought those reforms every step of the way.

Long Standing Problems

For years, the ASPCA refused to do an assessment of the shelter when requested (naively) by No Kill advocates saying they did not do them. In reality, to do so would have—to the extent they were honest—led to findings of poor and hostile treatment of the animals by the Pulliam team, along with dilapidated conditions and needless killing. But now that Pulliam is gone, the ASPCA is “assessing” the shelter and they apparently have contacted the press to set up a discussion of their “findings” even before the “findings” are completed or presented to the City for review. Some reform advocates are concerned that Newbury’s “assessment” is part of a larger game plan of attack concocted by her employer, the ASPCA. The target: the No Kill plan which includes a moratorium on convenience killing. And they have a right to be concerned: Aside from Pulliam, the biggest roadblock to No Kill in Austin has been the ASPCA. And Newbury’s history suggests she is philosophically aligned with their way of thinking.

There is little doubt that there are problems at TLAC; they have been festering for as long as Pulliam was the director. The physical shelter is in a state of disrepair, disinfection is difficult due to crumbling infrastructure, and staff is both ignorant of and fails to follow proper medical protocols, leading to disease and killing. In fact, these are exactly the conditions shelter reformers have long complained about. But as long as Pulliam was in charge, the ASPCA was content to look the other way and, in fact, attacked anyone who criticized those conditions. Any talk of poor care, of needless killing, of criticism of the status quo got you kicked out of the coalition and barred you from receiving the ASPCA’s largesse.

There is also little doubt that Pulliam’s legacy of poor and hostile treatment and dilapidated conditions will take some time to undo, unless a new director (the search continues) is given the authority and latitude to fix the problems which includes firing any holdouts from the underperforming, kill-oriented team she left behind.

But to blame the No Kill plan, which seeks to ensure that animals are vaccinated on intake, that rescue groups are given full access to the animals, that prohibits convenience killing, that puts a premium on adoption, and after being given an additional $800,000 in funding to an already generous budget by comparative standards (when most cities in America are looking to cut expenses) to further save lives, is not only dishonest, it is nothing short of reprehensible. But that has not stopped Pulliam, the Austin Humane Society, and of course, the ASPCA from doing so.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

As I said, there is no doubt that there are long-standing problems at the shelter and they need to be fixed. The million dollar question is whether Newbury will state what the problems inherited from Pulliam are in an objective manner; Or, as she has done in other places, whether she will use those long-standing problems to attack the No Kill philosophy, thus blaming years-old problems in Austin on a No Kill plan that was recently approved by the City Council and which was designed to fix those problems.

And that depends on which Newbury emerges. The one who recommends that:

• Foster care programs be curtailed by suggesting that it needlessly turns shelters into sanctuaries (decrying what she calls a “sanctuary rate”);
• Every other cage be kept empty (arguing in the past that this was necessary for disease control in a shelter that had never experienced a serious disease outbreak);
• The number of animals who should be made available for adoption be limited (fear mongering about too much consumer choice and a “market saturation index”);
• Healthy and treatable animals be killed by blaming the “irresponsible public” (her “community overpopulation index”); and,
• No Kill leads to suffering in shelters (“hoarding”).

Or, the one who sticks to medicine and identifies problems in an objective manner and suggests medical protocols to fix them, without getting into large policy and philosophical discussions she is grossly biased against? In other words, will we get a report from Mr. Hyde or from Dr. Jekyll?

She is capable of both. Her assessment of the neglectful and abusive King County Animal Care & Control was an example of the latter, focusing on medicine and medical protocols, a welcome departure from other shelters and other cities where her “analysis and recommendations” were more policy driven by an anti-No Kill political agenda with disastrous outcomes.

Read an expose called “Better Off Dead?” by a Madison newspaper about her regressive recommendations which caused cats to lose their lives at the Dane County Humane Society and reversed a multi-year decline in killing by clicking here.

Then read my 2007 blog that describes her other attacks against No Kill which appears below.

The ASPCA’s Last Stand?

Regardless of which Newbury emerges, the third and most vicious salvo by the ASPCA may yet be to come. And that one involves the influence on city officials by the ASPCA’s Karen Medicus, an anti-No Kill crusader who has been one of the biggest roadblocks to the emerging success in Austin. Medicus is the former director of the Austin Humane Society who once promised Austinites lifesaving success but failed miserably, despite a multi-million dollar Maddie’s Fund grant. Since that time, she has argued for the relocation of TLAC away from its central location conducive to adoptions to an out-of-sight, out-of-mind remote location in order to give shelter administrators bigger offices, even while curtailing available kennel and cage space for the animals.

Medicus claimed the shelter’s location did not matter, and that having adequate cages and kennels was irrelevent, arguing that “the problem is not getting adopters to the shelter, but rather, having enough desirable and placeable animals to choose from.” According to Medicus, why would you need more cages and kennels when the animals are not desirable? In other words, Pulliam’s failure to save more lives was not because TLAC failed to utilize the proven programs of the No Kill Equation, but because the animals themselves were not “desirable” or “placeable.” Unfortunately, Medicus’ relationship with city officials responsible for hiring TLAC’s next director has the potential to derail efforts to make Austin a model City of caring and compassion.

Leadership is the most important element of the No Kill Equation, without which all other efforts may fail. What TLAC needs is a hard working, passionate animal control director who is not content to continue killing, while regurgitating tired clichés about public irresponsibility and/or the myth of too many animals and not enough homes. It is the defining issue which largely determines whether lifesaving succeeds or fails in a community.

Will the ASPCA allow the will of the people determined to end the killing in Austin to reign supreme? Or will they try to use their influence to sabotage the hiring of a progressive director committed to saving lives and in the process sacrifice the animals to their own nefarious political agenda of power, greed, and control?

If history is any guide, the Austin Humane Society’s despicable claim that No Kill is killing kittens and the Newbury report may be nothing more than an effort by the ASPCA to soften the ground for the real fight over the next director that they seem determined to bring to Austin; compassion, democracy, good government, taxpayer accountability, and the lives of the animals be damned.

♦♦♦

Can You Kill Your Way to No Kill?

Dr. Hurley, Dr. Newbury, Dr. Semmelweis, and Death at a Midwest Humane Society

In February 2007, the Lied Animal Shelter in Las Vegas was forcibly closed down due to filthy conditions and dreadful treatment of animals. According to reports, sick animals were left to die in their cages, disease was rampant, and dogs were starving because of lack of food. The animals were not vaccinated on intake, sick animals were not treated, healthy animals were subsequently made sick, there was no isolation for sick animals, and there was a complete breakdown of basic principles of animal care and husbandry. The Lied Animal Shelter is a story of incompetent leadership, uncaring staff, a board of directors which failed to meet its oversight mandate, and a system which refused to put in place the programs and services that save the lives of animals. What happened at Lied Animal Shelter is one side of the worst kinds of animal sheltering.

The other side of the same coin (uncaring, incompetent shelter directors who oversee an equally uncaring and incompetent staff) are shelters that recklessly kill the vast majority of animals in their care in the face of responsible, proven lifesaving alternatives which they refuse to implement—In other words, run-of-the-mill high kill shelters such as those that can be found in many cities and towns across America. While the mechanics are different—Lied didn’t kill but left the animals to suffer and die on their own, the others simply kill them out of expediency—the underlying dynamic is the same: both shelters are outdated relics that refuse to modernize and put into place progressive programs and services which allow sheltering to be done humanely, responsibly, while saving the vast majority of dogs and cats. That the Lied Animal Shelter claimed it was “No Kill” is irrelevant. In the final analysis, it had more in common with high kill shelters and the leadership and staff who run them.

The Lied Animal Shelter—comprised of starving dogs, rampant disease, filth, animals suffering with no care—is not what the No Kill movement represents. In fact, No Kill is the opposite of hoarding, filth, and lack of veterinary care. The philosophical underpinning of the No Kill movement is to put actions behind the words of every shelter’s mission statement: “All life is precious.” No Kill is about valuing animals, which not only means saving their lives, but means good quality care. It means vaccination on intake, nutritious food, daily socialization and exercise, fresh and clean water, medical care, and a system built to find them all loving, new homes as soon as possible.

No Kill does not mean business as usual (poor care, hostile and abusive treatment of animals, warehousing) minus the intentional killing. It means modernizing shelter operations so that animals are well cared for and keep moving through the system efficiently and effectively and into loving, new homes. At the open admission No Kill shelter I ran, the average length of stay for animals was eight days, we had a return rate of approximately 2%, we reduced the disease rate by nearly 90% from the prior administration, we reduced the intentional killing rate by 75%, no animal ever celebrated an anniversary in the facility, and we saved 93% of all impounded animals. In short, from 2001-2004, we brought sheltering into the 21st Century.

Personal Agendas

But there are those who have seized upon the Lied Animal Shelter fiasco to promote their own agenda of defending an antiquated model of sheltering developed in the 19th Century which is based on killing, sweeping animals under the rug (more accurately, into the back room to be killed), based on archaic notions of “adoptability,” turning volunteers away and other regressive and obsolete practices. They are using the Lied Animal Shelter to denounce the No Kill paradigm by intimating—sometimes directly, more often indirectly—that Lied is the natural outcome of trying to end the killing of savable dogs and cats in shelters today. And two of the leading voices of this point of view are Dr. Kate Hurley and Dr. Sandra Newbury, veterinarians for the University of California at Davis Shelter Medicine program.

This is a betrayal of the worst kind. Even the Humane Society of the United States called Lied “one of the worst its ever seen.” It was extreme even in the eyes of an agency which accepts staggering high levels of killing as the norm. Therefore, using such an extreme situation as an example of No Kill, of what the natural alternative to ending the killing today would be, is egregious.

By denigrating No Kill as akin to warehousing and ignoring the protocols of shelters which have truly achieved No Kill, Drs. Hurley and Newbury appear to be arguing for nothing more than a nation of shelters firmly grounded in killing—a defeatist mentality that is inherently unethical and antithetical to animal welfare. To imply that No Kill means warehousing, therefore, is a cynicism which has only one purpose: to defend those who are failing at saving lives from public criticism and public accountability by painting a picture of the alternative as even darker.

At the Las Vegas shelter, a wholly incompetent and uncaring shelter director refused to vaccinate animals on intake, failed to practice basic husbandry, refused to treat sick animals, failed to isolate sick from healthy animals, failed to clean and sanitize, allowed animals to languish with illnesses and injuries, and failed to put in place the programs and procedures which vastly increase adoptions and lifesaving. This is not No Kill. This is animal cruelty, but HSUS—with Drs. Hurley and Newbury in tow—came in with needles blazing and oversaw the killing of 1,000 animals. (The Lied Animal Shelter is now killing dogs and cats after only 72 hours and officials there claim they are doing so based on the recommendation of the HSUS team. This not only replaces one “evil” with another, it even violates HSUS’ own longstanding recommendation that shelters should hold animals for at least five days.)

But if the No Kill model should be rejected, what do they recommend? For Dr. Newbury, the answer is simple and can be found right in the shelter of her hometown of Madison, Wisconsin—at the Dane County Humane Society (where both she and Dr. Hurley used to work, a shelter she currently consults with, and where her own model of sheltering is currently being practiced). Let’s see what the Newbury model means for the cats of the Dane County Humane Society.

Life and Death at the Dane County Humane Society

This year, over a period of several weeks, one by one, seventy-three cats were taken off of the adoption floor of the Dane County Humane Society in Madison, WI, to a room outside of public view. One by one, each was injected with poison from a bottle marked “fatal-plus” (or similar barbiturate). One by one, their bodies went limp and slumped to the table. One by one, each was put to death. Why were these 73 cats killed?

They were killed, according to recent reports, because the shelter decided it was going to keep every other cage empty and curtail other lifesaving programs, reducing the number of cages on its adoption floor by half. But since cats occupied those cages or were under the “care” of those other programs, they needed to be slaughtered first. This was necessary in order to “save more cats.” That’s right. According to shelter bureaucrats, by killing cats, by cutting the capacity of the shelter in half, they were professing the Orwellian logic that more cats would be saved…

At this shelter, every other cage is intentionally kept empty despite the fact that disease can be reduced by fostering sick animals, by isolating sick animals, by reducing disease rates through vaccination, proper handling, good cleaning and sanitizing protocols, and by reducing animal stress through daily interaction and socialization by volunteers. At the same time that the number of cages was reduced by half, however, the shelter restricted adoption hours and eviscerated its foster care program.

In response to a public backlash, the architect of this mass carnage claimed: “I am not in any way advocating for more euthanasia,” which is more double-speak since this is exactly what is being advocated. What else is the option when the number of cages is reduced by half, while the shelter is scaling back other opportunities—like adoption days and foster care programs—to save them?

According to Dr. Newbury, by killing the cats and then intentionally cutting shelter capacity in half, more animals will be saved over the course of the year or the next. If your head is spinning from the lack of logic, you are not alone. This argument was also lost on a reporter who noted that in fact, by killing more cats and cutting shelter capacity in half, more cats are likely to die, a fact confirmed by the rising death toll for cats at Dane County Humane Society. Since Dr. Newbury started with the Dane County Humane Society in 2003, the death toll for cats has been steadily rising. In 2003, the year she began, the cat save rate was on a mult-year rise culminating at about 80%. It has been declining every year since. Even while the Society is getting richer (its revenue is growing by the millions), it is killing more cats than in recent history.

According to a recently published report, the Dane County Humane Society’s “[killing] rate for cats reached 40% in October of this year, up from 29% in October 2006,” and this, despite falling intake rates. Despite the promise of more lifesaving, in fact:

The [kill] rate has not gone down. The shelter still kills about one-third of the nearly 7,000 animals it receives annually. And the numbers for cats are the worst. The shelter is actually taking in fewer felines – 3,000 so far this year, compared to 3,800 in 2006 – but is killing more of them. In 2003, the Humane Society [killed] 600 cats a year. By 2006, it was killing more than 1,200. And it’s on track to kill an even higher number this year.

On top of this, the Dane County Humane Society’s new rules:

Decreed that old or sick cats–even those with treatable conditions–would be [killed]. Kittens that arrive needing to be bottle fed would also generally be killed, since the Humane Society limited the number of foster families available to care for them to just 10.

As more progressive shelters have demonstrated, disease can be reduced by more adoptions (which is undermined when Dane County cuts back adoption hours), sending animals to foster care (which is undermined when Dane County emasculates the program), using volunteers to socialize the animals (which is undermined when volunteers are turned away or leave in frustration), and practicing good husbandry (vaccination on intake, careful handling, thorough sanitizing and cleaning protocols).

This has not been lost on the cat loving public. According to volunteers, any respiratory infections at the shelter were not the result of having cats in all the cages, it was the result of shelter staff “ignoring basic protocols, like washing their hands in-between handling animals.” Moreover, the shelter’s director publicly admitted under a reporter’s questioning that they have never had an epidemic of a serious disease!

Rejecting the Status Quo

While Drs. Hurley and Newbury continue to dig trenches to the past, the rest of us are building bridges to our inevitable No Kill future—A future that promises more life, more compassion, more success, more programs to save the lives of animals. In doing so, we are rejecting the consensus of killing and rejecting the “model” of empty cages, lack of foster care, and killing because the animals do not meet draconian definitions of objective beauty or based on regressive and obsolete notions of “adoptability.”

For in the end, our movement is about more than seeking shelters which simply label themselves as “No Kill” and proceed with business as usual, as the Lied Animal Shelter did. Our movement is about action and results, not mere words and promises. What we seek is a modernization and transformation of our shelters, exchanging century-old obsolete forms of doing business which recklessly embrace killing as a morally ethical means to an end, with shelters that uphold the life and welfare of animals as paramount, and adjust their operations accordingly.

What we demand, and what the animals deserve, are shelter directors and shelter “experts” who value life, and keep pace with progress and innovation, and with the new and exciting methods of animal shelter protocols developed over the last decade to keep animals clean, healthy, and well cared for, while finding homes for all but hopelessly vicious dogs and irremediably suffering animals. These are the only models which veterinarians at one of the nation’s most prestigious veterinary college should be using to train the next generation of veterinarians and to guide the current generation of shelter directors forward.

As a university and as a training ground for new veterinarians, the U.C. Davis program should be at the forefront of progressive shelter practices and of the dynamic and exciting changes occurring in the field of animal sheltering as a result of the No Kill movement. Instead, Drs. Hurley and Newbury irresponsibly cling to the past by promoting methods of sheltering that are antiquated, inhumane, and lead to unnecessary killing. This would be the equivalent of a medical school continuing to teach its students that leeches, bloodletting and magical incantations are a valid treatment for pneumonia, in the face of proven alternatives like antibiotics, fluid therapy and rest. It is nothing short of bad medicine—and a textbook example of the “Semmelweis Reflex,” the reaction so-called “experts” often exhibit when the status quo, which they represent, is challenged.

The Semmelweis Reflex

Historians have coined the term the “Semmelweis Reflex” to describe “mob behavior in which a discovery of important scientific fact is punished rather than rewarded.” In the nineteenth century, Dr. Ignac Semmelweis observed a higher incidence of deaths due to puerperal fever in maternity wards associated with teaching hospitals than in births attended by midwives. In trying to figure out why puerperal fever was a hazard of giving birth in a hospital rather than at home, Semmelweis opined that students and doctors might be carrying the diseases from autopsies they performed, while midwives who did not perform such procedures were not. Semmelweis also found that rigorous instrument cleaning and hand washing could bring the fever rate down to zero. Had doctors known at the time that germs caused disease, this finding would have been unremarkable.

Unfortunately, Semmelweis’ discovery predated the germ theory of disease. At the time, no one knew that asepsis was important. According to Semmelweis’ critics, hand washing wasn’t needed when they could clearly see that their hands had nothing on them. And, tragically, they ignored his recommendations and continued with business as usual, with deadly results for their patients. Once germ theory became known and established, however, Semmelweis was vindicated for his foresight. Of course, sterility through instrument cleaning and hand washing has since become the norm.

The housing, socialization, adoption, foster care, cleaning and vaccination protocols, medical and behavior rehabilitation and other efforts pioneered in communities like San Francisco and copied elsewhere provide a life-affirming model of sheltering which provides high quality care, reduced disease rates, even while keeping cages and kennels full as necessary and in foster care, while finding the vast majority of shelter animals loving new homes. These models were developed by caring and compassionate individuals, professionals, and in conjunction with veterinary institutions like Cornell University.

Rather than attack Semmelweis, doctors should have simply washed their hands, since Semmelweis pointed out that this eliminated deaths, even though, at the time, no one could explain why. Similarly, rather than attack the methods of sheltering which allow the vast majority of animals to be saved, even while operating at capacity-plus fostering, shelter administrators likewise should copy its precepts because it has been shown to work in other communities. But the vast majority of shelter directors refuse to innovate in this way.

But something more nefarious was at work in Semmelweis’ time than a failure of understanding about germs, and it is the same “Reflex” which is at work in sheltering today. In fact, what occurred was that Semmelweis was fired because doctors felt he was criticizing the superiority of hospital births over home births, something that threatened their position in the social hierarchy. And therein lies the rub. The archaic voices of tradition in sheltering are acting the same way as the doctors who put their own positions above their patients. They refuse to innovate and modernize precisely because they are threatened by the growing hegemony of the No Kill movement and what this means for their own stature in this movement.

As a movement and as a nation, we have a choice. We can embrace the No Kill philosophy, and the programs and services which make it possible, and end the unnecessary killing of 4.5 of the five million dogs and cats slaughtered each year in our nation’s dog and cat pounds. Or we can adopt the model that will perpetuate it. The same model that caused 73 cats at the Dane County Humane Society to be killed for one reason and one reason only: They happened to enter a shelter, run by a director, who erroneously believed that sheltering “experts” like Dr. Hurley and Dr. Newbury actually had something to teach her.

New York City in Chaos

Updated (July 15, 2010)

Further Updated (July 16, 2010)

Less than a month after the ASPCA and the Mayor’s Alliance succeeded in killing Oreo’s Law, New York City Animal Care & Control (ACC) has announced that it will not allow any new rescue groups to save the lives of animals until a new rescue policy is finalized at the end of August. Oreo’s Law sought to make such conduct illegal. According to rescue groups in New York City, the city pound “has suspended all new rescues that were recently approved.” These allegations were confirmed by e-mails obtained from ACC’s rescue coordinator.

The refusal to work with these groups is already costing the animals their lives. While groups like the ASPCA and Mayor’s Alliance claim that New York City is saving all healthy animals, the pound has contradicted those false assertions, killing hundreds in the process while stating “an overpopulation of adoptable animals requires us to humanely euthanize animals,” even as they are turning away rescue groups for the next two months.

On top of that, the pound has decided to renovate their kennels during the busiest time of year, cutting capacity, resulting in even more deaths. According to a July 1 e-mail obtained from ACC’s rescue coordinator:

The contractors are going to start work shortly on the final phase on the project, which involves replacing the floors in a significant portion of the building. We are excited for the many improvements that help make the shelter a better place, although the final phases of construction will pose challenges in addition those normally brought on by kitten season. Work on the floors is set to start Tuesday July 6th, and will be done in phases that have been carefully considered to have the least impact on our operations as possible. However, we will have to make adjustments for housing the dogs and cats and our housing capacity will be temporarily reduced until the project is complete. The work plan will initially impact our dog housing capacity, following by cat housing capacity, until the project is finished…

And it gets worse. In addition to claiming they do not have enough food to feed the animals right down the street from the nation’s wealthiest SPCA (the ASPCA takes in over $120,000,000 per year), the shelter is withholding pain medications from injured animals.

An e-mail obtained from ACC’s rescue coordinator says the above cat is in pain from an injury, but there are “No pain meds available to give the cat.” If rescue groups do not act within one day, the cat will be killed.

New York City is killing healthy animals, turning away rescue groups, running out of food to feed the animals, refusing to give pain medications to injured animals, and is doing construction during the height of the busy summer season, causing them to kill even more.

This is the model program touted by the Mayor’s Alliance, which will be featured at the Best Friends No More Homeless Pets Conference in Las Vegas this October by Jane Hoffman. This is the model program that Laura Allen of the Animal Law Coalition said NYS should follow in her opposition to Oreo’s Law.

Thanks to the ASPCA, Mayor’s Alliance, and Animal Law Coalition, New York City’s regressive pound has a license to turn away rescue groups and kill the animals they are willing to save. And thanks to Best Friends, Alley Cat Allies, and others who refused to support Oreo’s Law in deference to their relationships with these groups, that license is not being revoked anytime soon.

July15 update: It gets worse. I’ve been forwarded e-mails involving staff at CACC that confirm additional problems: cats and kittens in the “maternity wards” left without food or water, volunteers terminated for speaking out, animals wallowing in their own waste, lack of socialization, and sick animals getting substandard care. Where are the millions of dollars that the ASPCA and Mayor’s Alliance have raised for a “No Kill NYC” gone? And why aren’t Sayres and Hoffman speaking out in defense of the animals?

Further Update: Three kittens are scheduled to be killed in NYC at the city pound for being underweight and dehydrated. And they came from the ASPCA. An e-mail alert from CACC to rescue groups shows three kittens who are underweight, covered with fleas, and dehydrated. Despite taking in over $120,000,000 a year from unsuspecting donors who think the ASPCA will always come to the defense of animals in need, the fact that they sent these kittens to a high kill shelter shows where their priorities really lie. Because the pound kills even healthy animals, it will not invest care to save these kittens. Consequently, they have asked the rescue community to save them–the very same rescue community the ASPCA accuses of being hoarders in disguise that cannot be trusted, their basis for opposing Oreo’s Law. If rescue groups do not come forward today, these kittens will be put to death tomorrow. Jane Hoffman at the Mayor’s Alliance remains silent about it.

While the ASPCA & Mayor’s Alliance hoard their millions, four 5-week old kittens will be put to death tomorrow if rescue groups don’t pick up their slack.

Further Update (July 16): Despite animals sitting in their own waste, mothers and neonatals without food or water, ACC has shut down the program to new volunteers for the summer. It is not accepting new applications until September!

For further reading:

Hungry Dog to be Killed

Jerome is Dead as ASPCA Turns Its Back

Power to the People

Where Have You Gone Best Friends?

The Real Elephant in the Room

When the news was announced, animal lovers throughout Austin, Texas rejoiced. Some of them went out to celebrate. Some of them wept. One of them said they woke up the next morning and it was like standing on the deck of the Ark and seeing sunshine after 40 days of rain. Years of campaigning, years of fighting, years of grief and heartache, and she was finally gone. She was gone, she was gone, she was gone and good riddance. The director of Town Lake Animal Control, a woman who killed over 100,000 animals, who killed tens of thousands a year, hundreds per month, dozens per day, one animal roughly every 12 minutes the shelter was open to the public, was gone. And, with her, hopefully the era defined by killing despite readily available lifesaving alternatives, killing despite empty cages, killing despite a refusal—an ugly, selfish, unethical, indefensible refusal—to do what is necessary to stop killing.

This is a shelter director who killed kittens while refusing to allow the larger public to foster animals. This is a shelter director who said her staff did not have time to adopt out more animals; presumably because they were too busy killing them in back. This is a shelter director who illegally refused to provide care to sick animals, allowing them to suffer after the City Council unanimously ordered her to stop killing savable animals when there were empty cages to house them (hundreds per day according to state inspection reports). And she was gone. Forced into another job so she could vest in her retirement away from the animals she had the power to kill, a power which she exercised with ruthless efficiency.

But not everyone was celebrating. Ed Sayres, the head of the ASPCA, lamented her departure. Sayres, no stranger to killing in the face of lifesaving alternatives himself called her departure “horrible.” And why shouldn’t he? Sayres defended her even when she was killing kittens she refused to allow the public to foster. He defended her even when she was killing despite over 100 empty cages. He defended her even when she refused to implement common sense alternatives to killing. And he defended her with political and financial support he called “Mission: Orange,” but which local animal lovers called “Agent Orange” because it carpet bombed their efforts to reform the more egregious practices at the shelter under her watch.

On May 27, at an event for a local spay/neuter group, Sayres made it clear where he stood on the issues, and it was not on the side of No Kill advocates or the animals. “All right,” he said in the middle of his speech. “I’m going to talk about the elephant in the room.” He then went on to describe how “horrible” it was that “divisive incivility” in Austin led to the shelter director’s resignation. He stated that people who criticized her “wasted the time of everyone actually helping animals” and then went on to blame No Kill advocates, people working to stop the director from killing, for the killing of animals at the pound.

Sayres lamented her loss because he claimed that “Austin is Mission Orange’s most successful city” and the job will be more difficult without her. Successful? Under the first year of Agent Orange, killing actually went up 11%. Under the Sayres plan, Austin’s shelters impounded more animals, killed more animals, and saved fewer animals after the first year. While killing did decline the second year, it did so only because Austin Pets Alive saved those animals after the Sayres-backed shelter director ordered them to be killed.

Ed Sayres, who is using the might of the ASPCA to kill a law that will save more animals in New York for his own selfish ends, who defended the right of San Francisco shelters to kill animals, who kills animals himself, who said that killing is the moral equivalent of not killing, actually has the hubris to blame No Kill advocates for killing; has the gall to defend a shameless killer of animals rather than demand atonement for the 100,000 deaths she is responsible for; dares to lament her forced resignation which has the potential to create a new era of lifesaving; and, dares to call a movement to end killing, which directors like her refused to embrace, “divisive incivility.”

The storm has passed, the clouds have parted, and there is glorious sunshine. Everywhere in Austin there is now light after a long dark decade of night. And Sayres calls it “horrible.” That is the true “divisive incivility.” That is what is actually “horrible.” What Sayres saw as the elephant in the room was actually a mirror, his own reflection. His own “horrible” “divisive” reflection of “incivility.”

It is not civil to kill in the face of readily available lifesaving alternatives. It is not civil to kill kittens when people are willing to foster them. It is not civil to kill animals despite empty cages. It is not civil to complain about people wanting to adopt because it is too much work. It is not civil to oppose a moratorium on convenience killing. It is not civil to fight citizens who want to help create a more progressive shelter. It is not civil to withhold treatment from sick cats and allow them to suffer in order to falsely claim that No Kill amounts to warehousing. And it is the most divisive incivility to tell true animal lovers they can’t complain about it, that they can’t fight for the animals, that they should sit down and shut up and allow the killing to continue.

On a positive note, Sayres did reveal the only true elephant in the room. While the former shelter director’s boss was careful to say that she had been given a different job, while the “agent orange” partners pretended it was all voluntary, while the City bent over backwards to say that she chose to move on, Sayres is the first person to admit she was forced out.

But let us focus on silver linings and not dark clouds, lest we be guilty of “incivility.” Over the objections of the ASPCA-backed shelter director, the City Council unanimously embraced a No Kill plan. Over the objections of the ASPCA-backed shelter director, they forced her to provide medical care to sick cats. Over the objections of the ASPCA with all its money and all its might, they forced her out. Madam Director, don’t let the door hit you on the way out. To my friends in the No Kill movement, raise your glasses and pass the scotch!

♦

The bumper sticker on a car in the employee parking lot of the Austin pound. Is this civil?

The Rot at the Heart of the Movement

The last decade has proved to be one of the more remarkable in the history of animal sheltering in the U.S., right up there with the period following Henry Bergh’s incorporation of the ASPCA. In fact, the last decade saw the No Kill philosophy, its realization, and its spread, solidify; ensuring its future hegemony over the entire nation. And the first year of this new decade is no exception: with both No Kill ambitions and No Kill achievements here at home (such as in Kentucky, Texas, Wisconsin and Minnesota), and across the globe, in Canada, New Zealand, and Australia.

We’ve learned we do not have an animal problem (too many for the too few homes), we have a people problem, but not all people. Specifically, people in shelters, best summarized by the last two paragraphs of my book, Redemption:

In the end, there may be an overpopulation problem in the United States, but it is not the one we traditionally define. What we are actually suffering from, what is actually killing a high number of animals, is an overpopulation of shelter directors mired in the failed philosophies of the past and complacent with the status quo. As a result, a culture of lifesaving is not possible without wholesale regime change in shelters and national animal protection groups. Consequently, the most important single act—and the crucial first step—in achieving a No Kill nation is firing the current leadership of shelters across the country.

In the final analysis, animals in shelters are not being killed because there are too many of them, because there are too few homes, or because the public is irresponsible. Animals in shelters are dying for primarily one reason—because people in shelters are killing them.

The killing is the fault of uncaring bureaucrats, lazy and inept shelter managers, and national organizations committed to ensuring that the killing paradigm is not upended. Right now, today, roughly 3,000 shelter directors, backed by their cronies at the ASPCA, the Humane Society of the United States, and PETA, are holding back the will of the American people.  And no amount of spin, no amount of revisionist history, and no amount of trying to encourage through the “carrot” rather than the “stick” will change that unassailable fact. But there is no shortage of people trying. And, irrespective of whether their motivations are nefarious, benign, forgiving or strategic, they are not truthful. And the sooner we stop pretending otherwise, the sooner we can focus our efforts on overcoming what is really killing shelter animals. Two recent articles highlight this issue.

HSUS’ Legacy: Two Steps Forward, One Step Backward (and that is being generous)

Last week, while the Royal New Zealand SPCA announced it has formally embraced the No Kill Equation model of sheltering, as communities in New Zealand announced they have crossed the goal line, as communities in Wisconsin and Minnesota made formal announcements of achieving No Kill through the No Kill Equation model, as Duluth, MN announced it is very nearly there (88% rate of lifesaving and climbing), as several Canadian communities announced that they are aggressively moving in that direction (one community went from a 16% rate of lifesaving to 76% and climbing), as Australian communities have announced saving 100% of baby kittens, 93% of all dogs, and more, the Humane Society of the United States held its annual conference in Nashville, TN.

Aside from the main conference, which was largely business as usual, Maddie’s Fund held their second all-day workshop at Expo (though separate from the rest of the conference) on creating a No Kill community. They didn’t use that term, HSUS would not allow it (among other things), highly symbolic but perhaps a minor point. The workshop is a very welcome addition, as the people who attend Expo are the ones who need to hear the message the most. These are people who cheered and gave thunderous applause when HSUS’ resident expert on shelter killing announced—at Expo 2006—that shelters are “not killing” animals, that “they are ending their life, giving them a good death, humanely destroy—whatever” and then subsequently said since they are not killing, she “can’t stand the term No Kill shelter.”(Listen to the Orwellian rant—and the response to it—by clicking here.)

Progress? To be sure. To have Bonney Brown, Susanne Kogut, Mike Fry, and others provide living testaments to the ability to achieve No Kill and to do it overnight at HSUS Expo is a sign of the times. But to suggest, as the Richmond SPCA does, that groups like HSUS “have all embraced clearly articulated visions of adoption guarantee as the appropriate model for our nation’s communities and have committed to working for that outcome” and that Wayne Pacelle has “taken courageous steps to help push this issue as a part of a healthy national dialog and to make it safe for so many other organizations and communities to now embrace it” is simply indefensible. It is a lie. It is a lie to write that Ed Sayres and the ASPCA are doing this also. In killing Oreo and Max, in allowing young dogs to be killed, in trying to derail legislation that would create the infrastructure for a No Kill nation; he is actively fighting against it. Providing crumbs with one hand and taking them away with the other is hardly courage and it is hardly a “clearly articulated vision.” It is just that, crumbs. We’ll take them, but we shouldn’t celebrate the mediocrity, especially when we already hold the keys to ending the killing now and forever. And in many communities we have, despite Pacelle and Sayres, HSUS and ASPCA, denying that those communities even exist.

Neither Pacelle, nor Sayres, nor the respective organizations have ever articulated a vision in sheltering out of love of animals or a passion for saving lives. Any concessions—and that is what they are—have been the result of face saving necessity borne of public humiliation over their indefensible posturing in favor of killing. Pacelle has taken hits for supporting and lobbying for mass killing of dogs, of cats, for embracing the most notorious animal abuser of our time even while he lobbied to have the victims killed, and for stealing money from shelters and rescue groups through outright fraud in fundraising. He has no choice in the matter. No choice at all.

That Bonney Brown was able to present at a separate workshop held in conjunction with HSUS Expo that she turned her community right side up (in a community that the former director—a darling of HSUS and member of their national sheltering committee—said was impossible) is the very definition of poetic justice. That Mike Fry, who has two No Kill communities to his credit and who is an unapologetic champion of my work, was able to tell the truth at Expo is also a marvelous sign of the times. But “separate” is not equal, and more than that, not all of the workshop speakers were truthful.

In fact, one of the speakers at the workshop, the last of them, was Jane Hoffman of the Mayor’s Alliance for New York City animals. Besides admitting that even after six years and tens of millions of dollars, they are still failing by killing healthy animals, she told the assembled crowd they should not be made to feel guilty about killing healthy animals. Spit-take! Two steps forward, one giant step backward.

Even if a shelter manager or employee is going to ignore all evidence to the contrary in order to believe that pet overpopulation is real and insurmountable, even if they believe that no one will adopt animals, that they have no choice but to kill them, the very least they could do is feel bad about it. They are, after all, robbing an animal of his or her only life. All the animals have—their very lives—prematurely taken away. If they don’t feel guilty, they should not be working in a shelter, because to kill healthy animals without remorse, is to be cavalier and unfeeling. It is to be a butcher. But that is the message Hoffman was giving them. No remorse. No guilt. Self-medicating absolution for her efforts to undermine Oreo’s Law; to back the ASPCA even when they needlessly kill animals, allow animals to go hungry, allow puppies they are responsible for to be killed, abuse animals in their custody and then try to cover it up, and allow NYC shelters to kill healthy animals, because they write the checks to Hoffman’s group; and for her own failures to achieve No Kill despite tens of millions of dollars and a shelter system with some of the lowest per capita intake rates in the nation and the highest potential adopter base (8 million people).

In the end, the separate, day-long workshop was not the result of a clearly articulated vision of HSUS, courageous leadership on the part of Pacelle, or anything of the sort. It was forced upon Pacelle and HSUS, and while that is “progress,” it is a baby step when we could be at a full sprint; and even that step is undermined every time Pacelle backs killing, as he routinely does and did at the very same Expo. One of his experts and presenters in Nashville was from Multnomah County Animal Services. Under current leadership at MCAS, fewer animals are going home alive than before. The trend is to more killing, not less. And the trend is to greater punitive enforcement, rather than community-based programs intended to make it easy for people to do the right thing—exactly the opposite of what is needed to save lives. In other words, while Brown, Fry, and others were trying to build a bridge to the future, people like Hoffman and the leadership at MCAS dug trenches to the past. And it is costing animals their lives.

Ironically, I use MCAS as a case-study in my presentations on how shelters misuse temperament testing to justify killing healthy, friendly dogs and make it appear that they are doing a better job than they are. Here is just one example: A 35 pound puppy was evaluated by MCAS staff. According to their own reports, the puppy performed as a puppy should:

• Kennel Presentation: “Easy to leash from kennel doorway” “whole rear end wagging”
• Collar Put On: “Gets excited/playful”
• Entering Stranger: “Readily approaches everyone with [friendliness]”
• Handler: “Readily approaches everyone with [friendless]”
• Pet Back: “No guarding seen”
• Ears/Cheeks: “No guarding seen”
• Remove Bowl: “No guarding seen”
• Tail Stroke: “Mouthiness” “Whirl”
• Pick up Two Paws: “Mouthiness”
• Teeth Exam: “Allows exam”
• Hug: “Allows exam” “Interested in attention”

All those results are consistent with normal puppy behavior. This is a clearly a little fellow who loves people, is friendly and eager to please, and as Cyndi Lauper once sang, just wants to have fun. But the puppy was killed for being “vicious.” And it was not an isolated incident. Can you guess what breed the puppy was identified as? These are predetermined conclusions which have led to a rapidly expanding killing rate for these dogs, even while they tell the public the animals are “unadoptable.”

When these facts were brought to the attention of HSUS prior to Expo by Portland rescuers and No Kill advocates, HSUS threw the full weight of their support behind the shelter. John Snyder, a former kill shelter director himself who is now in charge of companion animal programs at HSUS, wrote them back saying that MCAS had HSUS’ unqualified endorsement. The American people and the animals deserve more from the nation’s largest, wealthiest, and arguably, most influential animal protection organization. But they are not getting it, despite the Richmond SPCA’s fantastical view to the contrary.

PETA’s Three Kinds of Lies: Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

The Animal Rights movement deserves better, too. At its core, the movement for animal rights is based on the principal that animals have a right to live and that we give it expression through laws to promote and protect that right. But you wouldn’t know it by listening to PETA. The largest “animal rights” group believes that people have a right to kill animals. As such, they have more in common with the industry groups they claim to be fighting than they admit. And they certainly practice what they preach with a relish unmatched except by the slaughterhouse industry. Last year, they killed 97% of all animals they sought out, the year before it was 96%, and the year before that, 91%. In 2009, less than ½ of 1% of the animals at PETA were adopted. They kill healthy, adoptable animals. They advocate for the mass slaughter of dogs someone says looks like pit bulls. They advocate for the mass killing of free living unsocialized cats. They routinely defend some of the most abusive and draconian shelters in the nation. And they even support breed bans in communities that turn around and forcibly take family pets, and then sell them for animal research. They are, quite simply, the worst of the worst.

They lie to people saying all the animals they kill are irremediably suffering or hopelessly ill. They lie to people by saying that breed bans and rounding up and killing free roaming cats are both necessary and proper. And they claim the animals want to die—that killing them is a “gift.” And then they lie to people through manipulative use of statistics to claim that animals in pounds are being killed because there are too few homes for them.

Actually, by PETA’s own data, there are plenty of homes for shelter animals. In a newly released May 2010 report, PETA says that 8 million animals enter shelters and of these, half are already being saved through a combination of adoption and reclaim. That leaves, by their own admission, “3 to 4 million cats and dogs” being killed, many of them healthy. But the conclusion they reach that they are being killed “because there simply aren’t enough good homes for them” is a fabrication. Moreover, the reality is that the number is closer to, and even well below, the low end of 3 million.

If shelters did a better job returning lost animals home, they could, for example, increase the percentage of dog reclaims from an average of about 25% to 60%. If shelters ignored PETA’s anti-TNR policy, they could release these cats to their habitat, rather than kill them. If they had pet retention programs to help people overcome the behavior, medical, and environmental conditions which cause them to surrender animals, they could reduce by as much as 30% the number of animals coming in to the shelter. If they utilized foster care programs, they wouldn’t kill the underaged animals entering their facility. And if they had good customer service, employed basic marketing principles, and comprehensively implemented an adoption program, they’d have little trouble finding homes for the 2 to 3 million animals being killed in U.S. pounds and shelters who need adoption. That’s potentially 2 million dogs and cats competing for the 17 million people who are looking to bring a new dog or cat into their homes, have not decided where that animal will come from, and can be influenced to adopt from a shelter.

So, once again, animals are being killed in shelters not because of pet overpopulation, but because people in shelters—and butchers like Newkirk—are killing them. But too many people and organizations such as Pacelle and Sayres, HSUS and the ASPCA, who should know better are still speaking PETA’s dead language of pet overpopulation, giving Newkirk and shelter directors across the country the excuse and political cover they need to kill. And they are using it today. They are telling people not to feel guilty about killing healthy animals. And they are writing 10 year plans for what should occur overnight, as it has in communities across the globe.

An Absence of National Leadership

Right now, neither HSUS or the ASPCA has taken a true and comprehensive leadership position on creating a No Kill nation. We best serve the animals by holding them accountable, not by whitewashing the truth in the hopes that they can be gradually influenced in a more life affirming direction through carrots. History proves the latter view wrong, as every gain in this movement, has been fiercely fought for and hard won. But even if people or organizations believe the carrot is better than the stick, it does not warrant misrepresentations of whom and what Ed Sayres and Wayne Pacelle, the ASPCA and HSUS, truly stand for. And what they stand for, pure and simple, is death. There is no courage in that. It is, in fact, the coward’s way, a refusal to stand up for what is right, because they don’t care enough about the animals to do what is in their power to do: demand an immediate end to the whole bloody mess.

It is the rot at the heart of the animal protection movement, and no amount of spin, sanitizer or perfume can eliminate the stink. It must be cut out and discarded. By calling them visionaries, we only embolden them. The end result is both a tragic embrace of incrementalism that needlessly increases the body count of dead animals; and cooption of the language of No Kill, which they then turn around and willfully use to undermine it.

We can end the killing and we can do it today. But that requires leadership, which neither is willing to provide. Their size, their wealth, their influence could be a game changer for the animals. But aside from a few crumbs, neither is offering it. In fact, what they offer with one hand, they take away with the other. Tell the animals needlessly ending up in landfills that these groups are courageous and visionary. And it will literally, very literally and tragically, fall on deaf—indeed, dead—ears.

Jerome is Dead as ASPCA Turns its Back

Ed Sayres’ uncaring has cost another animal his life. The head of an agency that took in $127,871,245 in one year alone, ignored pleas by the city’s pound to save Jerome, a seven month old dog originally adopted from the ASPCA itself and for which it was responsible. When the call went out to save the dog, some rescuers thought it was a joke, given that the dog’s microchip registered to the ASPCA and the ASPCA is the richest humane society in the nation. But it was no joke: the ASPCA refused to pick Jerome up from the pound. And the dog is now dead. To justify the killing, the city pound claimed the dog guarded his food, a condition which should never result in a dog being killed because the prognosis for rehabilitation is always good and the ASPCA has enough resources to make cost, which is negligible to begin with, nonetheless irrelevant.

“Out of sight, out of mind” appears to be the motto defining Sayres’ tenure at the ASPCA, even if it means an animal is needlessly put to death.  And the $20,000,000 Alliance for New York City’s Animals did nothing to stop it. An e-mail by the city pound to Alliance founder Jane Hoffman that was sent the day before the dog was killed with a plea to save the dog apparently went unheeded. On April 7, the dog was given a fatal dose of barbiturates. His body then discarded into a dumpster.

The puppy’s death is just one more in a long line of scandals that have rocked both the ASPCA and the Alliance for New York City Animals, despite the claims by Ed Sayres and Jane Hoffman that their combined efforts make New York City a national model of compassionate care. This includes:

• The needless killing of Oreo, despite a rescue alternative;
• The needless killing of Max, despite a rescue alternative;
• New York City’s pound running out of food to feed the animals despite being down the street from the ASPCA, the nation’s wealthiest humane society, and an Alliance that has taken in roughly $20,000,000 to help homeless animals;
• Threatening to kill dogs for being hungry;
• Claiming to have saved all healthy animals, but admissions by the city pound that it does kill them;
• Threatening to kill healthy and treatable animals every single day; and,
• Trying to kill “Oreo’s Law” in order to preserve lucrative positions of power even if it means animals are needlessly killed in shelters throughout the state.

All of this in a city with the richest humane society in the United States, and one of the top 200 wealthiest charities overall. All of this in a city with an Alliance that has taken in roughly $20,000,000 to improve conditions for homeless animals. One agency has taken in tens of millions, the other takes in hundreds of millions annually, and neither was willing to save the life of a seven month old puppy.

For additional reading:

ASPCA chief’s tenure marked by unconscionable policies

Hungry Dog to be Killed

To kill animals in New York, the ASPCA goes after them in California

Power to the people

Yes on Oreo’s Law

Hungry Dog to be Killed

Update: Saved by rescue. Lucy goes to a foster home. While the ASPCA argues that rescue groups are “dog fighters” and “hoarders” in disguise in their perverse effort to derail Oreo’s Law, time and time again, rescue groups are the ones who do the lifesaving while the millionaire organizations turn their backs.

As I blogged earlier today, Jane Hoffman and Ed Sayres, who collectively have tens upon tens of millions of dollars pass through their hands every year, claim they are national No Kill leaders and that New York City is a national model. But in reality, while they sit in their offices collecting their paychecks, New York City animal control kills healthy animals every day, threatens to kill healthy animals every day, and doesn’t even have enough food to feed the animals.

Let me repeat that, the shelter down the street from the nation’s wealthiest humane society and one of the top 200 richest overall charities in the U.S., can’t even feed the animals. Despite the fantastical sums of money at Jane and Ed’s disposal–and no sooner had I posted that, that an e-mail came across my desk showing what really happens at this “model” city.

Meet Lucy.

Lucy is sitting on death row at New York City’s animal control shelter. Why? She’s hungry. She came in to the shelter severely underweight. And they “tested” her right away and found that she doesn’t like people giving her food and then trying to take it away. That is one of the bogus tests shelters use to claim skinny, hungry dogs are “food aggressive.”

Here are the results of her “temperament test”:

• Stare=1 soft eyes, ears back, mouth close, scared, no aggression show
• Sensitivity=1 soft body, ears back, accepts the touch
• Tag=2 does not engage in play, nervous, no aggression show
• Pinch=1 no response
• Pinch II=1 no response
• Food Aggression=5 curls lip, shows teeth, keeps head in dish (very under weight)
• Toy Aggression=1 no interest
• Rawhide Aggression=1 no interest
• Dog to Dog=1 approaches to investigates turns away

None of the results show any kind of aggression: “no aggression,” “accepts the touch,” “no response,” “approaches.” Except when they try to take her food away, she keeps her head in the dish and shows her teeth which they note is because she is “very underweight.” But because of that, Lucy is scheduled to be killed.

Once again I make the plea: Jane and Ed, come down from your penthouses and FEED THE ANIMALS. Don’t allow them to be killed for being hungry.

♦

The earlier post about NYC is here:

Back to Basics: #1. Food

The New York City-based ASPCA’s Sarah McLachlan “Angel” commercial alone expanded the ASPCA’s already swelled coffers by $30,000,000 in one year. Add to that the tens of millions given to the Mayor’s Alliance of NYC Animals by other funders to save and care for New York City’s animals, and “lack of resources” for the animals of NYC does not seem to be a problem. So, how is it that despite a relatively low per capita intake rate, the wealthiest humane society in the country and one of the 200 richest charities overall down the street, and a coalition with over $20 million in revenue dedicated to helping NYC animals, that NYC kills healthy animals and threatens to kill them every single day if rescue groups do not take them?

And, even more insane than that, how is it that NYC shelters are running out of food?

NYC shelters have started putting out frantic appeals saying they do not have enough food to feed the animals in their care. According to one such appeal put out:

Dramatic budget cuts have forced Animal Care & Control of NYC to look to the public for food donations.

AC&C’s primary source of funding is the City of New York. Due to the current fiscal environment, that support has been drastically cut. Your food donations are now desperately needed for the hundreds of animals in their three care centers. And they could be needed for months.

NYC a national model? Perhaps of greed and self-serving leadership. Hey Jane and Ed, come down from your NYC penthouses and feed the animals.

The ASPCA’s One-Two Punch

Under siege since his callous killing of Oreo, an abused dog who survived being thrown off a rooftop in Brooklyn but could not survive the “rescue” by the ASPCA, ASPCA President Edwin J. Sayres is fighting legislation that would make it illegal for shelters to kill animals a qualified non-profit organization is willing to save. The law is named after Oreo, and threatens to memorialize for all time her betrayal at his hands.

According to inside sources, Sayres is seeking a report to “claim” that California’s Hayden Law, upon which Oreo’s Law is based, is harmful to animals. In the process, he is not only attempting to stall progressive legislation in New York, but he is threatening to turn legislative progress back by more than a decade in California, threatening the lives of animals on both coasts.

Adding further insult to injury, a source close to the ASPCA also reports that Sayres will also commission a survey of rescue groups in New York State to “prove” that they already have access to animals. However, the source reports that they will only talk to rescue groups recommended by New York kill shelters in order to arrive at the pre-determined conclusion. Rescue groups that are denied animals because of the arbitrary policies of shelters and which would provide substantial proof of the need for the law will not be allowed to participate.

Read “To Kill Animals in New York, the ASPCA Goes After them in California” by clicking here.

Power to the People

Understanding why Ed Sayres, Jane Hoffman, and now Laura Allen oppose Oreo’s Law, even though their opposition means animals will continue to be needlessly killed.

Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts… the fear of a loss of power. –John Steinbeck

When Oreo’s Law was introduced, it quickly gained the support of leaders of the No Kill movement. On behalf of the No Kill Advocacy Center, I wrote in support applauding the “common sense and compassionate approach to protecting animals’ lives and empowering those who want to save them.” The most successful shelter directors in the country, those running open admission animal control shelters saving over 90 percent of the animals, uniformly embraced it, including Bonney Brown, Susanne Kogut, and Abigail Smith. The nation’s top shelter reform advocates, including FixAustin, wrote letters of support. The nation’s top law professors uniformly embraced it. The media, including Christie Keith of the San Francisco Chronicle and Animal Wise Radio, have called for every state to pass such a law. New York-based rescue groups including Pets Alive, Empty Cages Collective, and others, are pushing for its passage. And progressive animal rights groups like Friends of Animals came out in strong support.

Predictably, Ed Sayres—Oreo’s killer—opposed it, even though he supported identical rescue group access rights in California. In fact, given that Oreo’s Law has recently been amended to provide for additional protections, there is no basis on which Sayres can legitimately explain why he supports rights for rescue groups in California, but not for rescue groups in New York State—other than his own unethical motives to bury his killing of Oreo, even at the expense of thousands of animals being killed every year because of it. And to kill Oreo’s Law, as easily as he killed Oreo for which the law is named, Sayres now has two others supporting his position that animals in New York State (NYS) shelters should continue to be killed, while rescue groups willing to save them should be turned away: (1) Jane Hoffman of the Mayor’s Alliance for NYC Animals, and (2) Laura Allen of the so-called “Animal Law Coalition.”

If Ed Sayres is motivated by sheer self-preservation and spite against those who dare question his unfettered discretion to kill animals, what, then, is motivating these two?

For over a hundred years, animal shelters in this country and their allies working at large, national animal protection organizations have argued that the killing of animals in shelters is unavoidable, and that the irresponsible American public is to blame. Without an alternative model to challenge the assumptions upon which these calculations were based—animal shelters were, by default, granted almost unequivocal discretion to kill millions of animals a year, while blaming others for the need to do so.  Not only did this stymie any innovation seeking to reduce the numbers of animals killed, but, having been unchallenged in this course of action for so long, it had the unfortunate side effect of creating the expectation among shelter directors that they should be able to operate without public scrutiny, comment or accountability for their actions and decisions.

In the late 1990’s, when the burgeoning No Kill movement proved that many of the assumptions upon which traditional sheltering were based were, in fact, untrue, and that nearly all animals entering shelters can be saved, traditional sheltering models had by that time become so firmly entrenched—and those championing them so large and influential—that any challenge to their hegemony was met with recrimination and hostility. And since that time, animal advocates throughout the country, working to reform their local shelters by demanding innovation, modernization and greater lifesaving, have almost universally found themselves at cross purposes with not only their local shelters which refuse to reform, but, just as often, the large, national groups, such as the ASPCA and HSUS, which come to the defense of their local shelter and its archaic, regressive policies which favor killing, and, therefore, a continuation of the paradigm upon which their power is predicated.

As a result, it is not uncommon for shelters to refuse the assistance of grassroots rescue organizations willing to save the animals they are determined to kill. Time and again, these organizations hold the animals hostage, ignoring the requests of local sanctuaries and rescue groups willing to assume responsibility and liability for their care, even as they then turn around and kill them, just as the ASPCA did to Oreo.

But these rescue groups are not going away quietly, as the furor over Oreo’s killing has proven. Despite the entrenchment of groups like the ASPCA, the widespread success of the No Kill movement has invigorated animal lovers nationwide, and one of the results of that success has been an exponential increase in the number of rescue organizations. Their efficacy, their dedication, and their willingness to do the lifesaving that shelters and the large national organizations have for so long argued is impossible threaten to expose the lies upon which the historical inaction of shelters and the large national groups is based. It is why Ed Sayres chose to kill Oreo rather than give her to an organization that was willing to go the extra mile for her, when the ASPCA was not, despite raising over $100 million dollars last year from an animal loving American public after promising to do just that in such circumstances, and for such animals.

And it is why Jane Hoffman, who now keeps the rescue groups of New York City under her regressive rule of thumb, is also opposed to Oreo’s Law. Her opposition is, at its core, about fear—a fear of losing power. A fear that Oreo’s Law—by eliminating her role as the unnecessary “middle man” between shelters and rescue groups will render her obsolete, as it should.

Follow the Money

As head of the Mayor’s Alliance for NYC Animals, Jane Hoffman wields a tremendous amount of power, with tens of millions of dollars flowing through her hands. Her group has received over $5 million from Ed Sayres at the ASPCA, and over $13 million to date from Maddie’s Fund. She also received an additional $250,000 from Sayres in 2009.

Given the money that flows from Sayres to Hoffman, is it any surprise that she supports his position in opposing Oreo’s Law? Is it any surprise that she immediately wrote a letter in defense of the ASPCA after the furor erupted over Oreo’s killing? To understand Hoffman’s opposition, one need only follow the money. And, more importantly perhaps, follow it to where it dries up.

While Sayres continues to write checks to Hoffman’s group, such as the additional $150,000 given in 2009 for her discretionary use, the initial $5 million from the ASPCA has been spent. And the Maddie’s Fund project ends this year. The Mayor’s Alliance and her role as its head cannot survive in New York without grant funding from the ASPCA. And there lies the rub. Hoffman needs Ed Sayres’ money and control over the rescue groups to stay in power, and Ed Sayres needs Jane Hoffman’s support to fight a law which will forever memorialize his betrayal of an abused dog. It is an unholy alliance based on greed, naked self-interest, and the preservation of near unequivocal power the two currently enjoy over the smaller non-profits in New York City.

Right now, Hoffman has the power to remove the rights of rescue groups to get animals from New York City’s animal shelters, and she is not shy about telling groups who oppose her of that. In order to be allowed to rescue animals who are on the kill list, Hoffman has to approve them. Like the old “Ward Bosses” of the 19th Century, her power is based on the largess and her unfettered discretion to take away a rescue group’s ability to save animals from death row. But when the Maddie’s funding dries up and without an influx of money from the ASPCA, the power she yields as a result of control over the purse strings also dies. As a result, Hoffman has hatched a plan to expand the alliance to a statewide organization that will have the power to regulate all rescue groups, with—drum roll, please—herself as its head. If Oreo’s Law passes and rescue groups have a legal right to shelter animals, her plan is rendered impotent and consequently, she loses all the power she currently has. Rescue groups will no longer be beholden to her “certification” of their fitness. Subject to law (including an IRS designation, a mission of animal rescue or adoption, and no record of convictions for neglect or abuse), rescue groups can cut out the middle man and Hoffman goes from Ward Boss to persona non grata.

All of the power in the humane movement is consolidated in the hands of the very few, like Hoffman and Sayres, and it is to their advantage to keep it that way. Laws which grant a legal right of shelter access to small, non-profit rescue organizations level the playing field and empower the grassroots, giving them the same rights, privileges and access to animals they exist to protect as the large non-profits enjoy. And that is deeply threatening to people like Sayres and Hoffman. And in their fear of losing power, they deceptively seek to play upon our fears—by arguing that dedicated rescue groups are the real threat—they are what we should fear, because they are hoarders and dog fighters in disguise. And sadly, these deadly, dangerous, and antiquated views have found a champion in another so-called animal activist—and friend of Jane Hoffman—in Laura Allen of the “Animal Law Coalition.”

The Tyranny of Dead Ideas

Laura Allen runs a New York-based group she calls the “Animal Law Coalition.” A coalition, however, is “an alliance of distinct organizations or parties.” But the Animal Law Coalition is a coalition in name only. It is one person: Laura Allen. And Laura Allen has come out in opposition to Oreo’s Law by arguing that shelters should be trusted when making behavioral determinations, by misrepresenting the law relating to California’s Hayden Law upon which Oreo’s Law is based, and by arguing that animals are better off dead than in the arms of the rescue groups which she says are most likely animal abusers anyway.

According to Allen and her anti-Oreo’s Law propaganda, we need to “respect” the decisions made by shelters about which dogs are aggressive. In her latest salvo, despite the fact that the ASPCA refuses to provide the videotape of Oreo’s alleged aggression and Oreo’s Law will primarily save kittens and puppies and healthy/ friendly dogs and cats, Allen writes that:

After months of care and evaluation, the dog was determined to be “unpredictably aggressive,” biting even caregivers.

According to Allen, that is good enough. Rescue groups should not be allowed to second guess these decisions, should not have access to these dogs, should not be allowed to bring in their own evaluators, should not be allowed to employ efforts at rehabilitation, and in light of her opposition to Oreo’s Law, this is true even at shelters that give dogs only the minimum time according to law before they are killed—a paltry five days for strays and zero days for owner relinquished animals.

But while Allen argues that such determinations are adequate for the dogs of NYS—even when it means those dogs are killed while rescue groups willing to save them are turned away—it is not good enough for her own dog. When it comes to the life of her own animal, Allen has an altogether different standard. In opposing Oreo’s Law, she is opposing legislation mandating action which saved her own dog from death.

Allen has never worked in an animal control shelter, and perhaps has never even been to one—except in Seattle, where her and her husband’s dog was impounded after biting someone, was determined to be dangerous, and was sentenced to death. Instead of respecting the decision of the shelter as she admonishes others to do, Allen and husband Russ Mead enlisted a rescue group, Best Friends, to save their own dog’s life from a shelter determined to kill him. And Best Friends did, on condition that the dog never be allowed to leave a lifetime care facility. It sounds remarkably similar to Oreo, where Pets Alive offered lifetime care. The difference of course is that Oreo was not adjudicated to be dangerous by a court and never attacked anyone. The other difference of course is that, in the case of Allen’s dog, the rescue group was given the ability to save a life by being rescued from the shelter, while Oreo, and the thousands of anonymous dogs and cats unknown to her at shelters throughout NYS, Allen’s viewpoint seeks to condemn to death.

The praise and confidence she places in shelter directors throughout NYS does not extend to those who judged her own dog dangerous because when Best Friends invited Seattle Animal Control director Don Jordan to speak at their conference, Allen’s husband Russ Mead called Best Friends and let fly a string of epithets against them for inviting that “*&^%#$” who was going to kill their dog.

Yet in spite of this experience, Allen published an opposition piece when Oreo’s Law was first introduced arguing, of all things, that it should be opposed because it goes “too far” and saves “too many” animals. Allen actually opposed Oreo’s Law because the law was not limited to “adoptable” and “treatable” animals the way she claimed the California law on which it is based is. In other words, she was essentially arguing that the law had the potential to save too many animals. As unethical as that position is, it was also a misreading of California law.

According to UCLA Law Professor Taimie L. Bryant, the Hayden Law’s primary author,

The California version of Oreo’s law did not limit rescue groups’ right of access to shelter animals to only “adoptable” and “treatable” animals as defined in the public policy statutes of the Hayden Law. The specific statutes of the law that give rescue groups rights of access (Food and Agricultural Code sections 31108 and 31752) explicitly exclude from rescue groups only those animals who are irremediably suffering from a serious illness or severe injury such that immediate euthanasia is the only humane alternative.

Language about “adoptability” and “treatability” do appear in public policy statutes that are part of the Hayden Law. However, the purpose of those statutes is to assert the preference of the people of California for adoption and rehabilitation instead of killing shelter animals. There are no specific duties in those statutes, and they do not constrain the application of the specific statutes that provide for release to rescue groups.

Of course, one would expect an “Animal Law Coalition”—even a coalition in name only as her group is—to celebrate, rather than condemn, expanding the scope of the bill to save animals such as feral cats, as well as neonatal kittens and puppies. But equally disturbing is that even after being informed of her misreading of the law, Allen refused to correct the error on her website. To this day, she continues to intentionally promote the misinformation in order to derail Oreo’s Law from passage. And she has even gone so far as to ask people to write the legislature in opposition based on her false assertions and false comparisons to Hayden.

Allen also recently posted another call for opposition to Oreo’s Law, claiming rescue groups cannot be trusted and the animals are better off dead, another equally offensive misrepresentation: Day in and day out, animal rescuers show tremendous courage and compassion—visiting what is often the one place on earth hardest for them to go as animal lovers: their local shelters. And yet they go back, again and again. They endure the hostile treatment. They endure the heartbreak of seeing the animals destined for the needle. They endure having to jump through unnecessary and arbitrary hurdles set by shelter directors who are holding the animals they want to save hostage. They endure having to look the other way at abuse of other animals, because if they don’t, if they speak out, they will be barred from saving any animals. And this law would make their lives easier—their work less difficult. It would empower them, tip the balance more in their favor, and lessen their daily burden. That Allen would fail to support such a law, or worse, would dare oppose it by claiming that these dedicated, hard working rescuers are, in reality, dog fighters and hoarders in disguise not only is offensive, but a betrayal of these selfless, compassionate individuals, and true animal lovers.

Moreover, after all the evidence of abuse, cruelty, neglect and killing that is rampant in our nation’s shelters, how can Allen oppose Oreo’s Law by deferring to their authority? By arguing that animals are better off killed by shelters, who often neglect and mistreat them in the process, than in the protective embrace of rescue groups made up of people truly dedicated to their well-being?

In the No Kill movement, our mission is two-fold. First, we must reform our nation’s broken animal sheltering system so that the animals who enter them will get the chance at life millions are now so cruelly denied. But reforming a shelter, wearing down the opposition, forcing the replacement of a regressive director with one dedicated to saving lives—all of these things take time. And time is one thing that animals entering shelters today do not have. To help these animals, we need to offer something more immediate. They need a way out. They need rescuers who want to save them to have the power to do so even when a director says, “No.” And they need that now, because tomorrow will be too late.

The second goal of the No Kill movement is therefore to arm those who want to save animals with the power to do so. Like the network of “safe houses” which protected runaway slaves as they fled north to freedom, the thousands of rescue groups, No Kill sanctuaries and No Kill shelters throughout our nation are our movement’s own safe houses. And they must be supported, and empowered through law. That goal is, in fact, fundamental to what our movement is all about, because that is what the animals most desperately need. And not only will doing so save animals today, but it will save them in perpetuity since the power of one director to say “Yes” to saving lives can be taken away by the next director who says “No,” absent a law to the contrary. That is why a shelter can be progressive one day, and moving in the opposite direction the next. Animals should be saved regardless of who is running our shelters and legislation like Oreo’s Law gives rescuers the power to do so.

But Allen is no champion of No Kill. In this case, she is a proponent of killing and a prophet of doom. And in the process, she attempts to derail progress by opposing legislation which would empower others to save them, and by throwing up smokescreens such as fears about hoarders and dog fighters to portray greater lifesaving as a threat to the animals. The animals are, in her own self-serving, delusional, and antiquated thinking, better off dead at the hands of even under-performing and even cruel shelter staff than in the protection embrace of animal rescuers: all ideas that successful, progressive, and forward thinking animal activists now wholly reject.

Laura Allen’s Myopia

It is an inevitable part of working in the animal protection movement that one is exposed to dogmas and mythology built up to rationalize and explain the killing in shelters. Too often, activists become blinded by these explanations. Slowly, they stop listening to their common sense, and let their fears and phantoms guide their advocacy. They become lost in the wilderness of their own making, unable to see the forest through the trees, and tragically lose sight of what they—and our movement—should be striving for. As a result, they hinder, rather than promote, the welfare of animals, by advocating bizarre, irreconcilable propositions that make no sense whatsoever: such as arguing that animal rescuers should be denied the right to save animals on death row because they might be hoarders or dog fighters in disguise. In doing so, they advocate positions that are the antithesis of those they should be championing as people who claim to speak on behalf of animals. They fail to do what is required of them as animal activists—recognizing and hailing success, such as the introduction of Oreo’s Law, and helping to ensure its passage.

And, despite Allen’s hair splitting, Oreo’s Law has significant protections that even the California version does not have. And yet even without these protections, the California law has not led to an epidemic of hoarders and dog fighters exploiting it, as was predicted by fear mongers who opposed it then. In fact, it has led to thousands of animals being saved, rather than killed. And while Allen cites Taimie Bryant and law professor Rebecca Huss for her baseless proposition, she ignores the fact that both of them not only support Oreo’s Law, they have written letters to the NYS legislature in support of the law.

The Only Thing We Have to Fear is Fear Itself

As a movement, we must be guided by our greatest hopes, and not our darkest and unsubstantiated fears. And when it comes to hoarders, the irrational and at times hysterical phobia of them within the humane movement is wholly out of all proportion to the actual threat. Only 4% of animals in shelters nationwide are impounded because of neglect or abuse (and even a smaller percentage of these are the victims of dog fighters or hoarders). And while that is still too much, it is by comparative standards, rare compared to the 96% of animals who are not. As the comment someone posted on Allen’s website indicated:

The question is, are there more unreputable 501c3s hoarding? Or [shelters] killing animals unnecessarily? I think most people know the answer to that one…So, we must ensure that the minute possibility of an animal making its way into the hands of a hoarder is prevented instead of preventing the REAL probability the animal will die in a shelter?

In short, Allen’s rationale for opposing Oreo’s Law comes down to the disturbing notion that we must kill animals to keep them safe, the very kinds of insidious arguments the “catch and kill” sheltering establishment has been peddling for decades to justify their paradigm of high rates of killing. In 1968, then HSUS Vice-President of Companion Animals, Phyllis Wright, wrote,

I’ve put 70,000 dogs and cats to sleep… But I tell you one thing: I don’t worry about one of those animals that were put to sleep… Being dead is not cruelty to animals.

She then described how she does worry about the animals she found homes for. From that disturbing view, HSUS coined a maxim that says we should worry about saving lives but not about ending them and successfully propagated this viewpoint to shelters across the country. And after turning away both adopters and rescuers, these shelters turn around and kill these very animals.

Despite wrapping opposition in legalese based on a misreading of California law, trying to confuse the issue by discussing other aspects of Hayden, by claiming California passed right of shelter access because of a “crisis” in killing in California which she claims does not exist in New York State (since when did New York State become No Kill?), and by citing both Professor Bryant and Huss out of context and ignoring that both actually support Oreo’s Law, Allen’s opposition amounts to nothing more than: Let’s kill the animals now to keep them safe from possible future harm. An inherently unethical and deeply disturbing contradiction.

But she does not stop there. Allen goes further, by offering three other red herrings. Beyond the fear mongering about hoarders and dog fighters, Allen claims that Oreo’s Law could lead to a future crackdown on dogs  because rescue groups will release dangerous dogs all over the state, which will go on to attack people. Not only has this not occurred in California based on the law which has been in effect for 11 years, it is pure fear baiting.

Second, she cautions that it could undermine the Mayor’s Alliance of NYC, costing animals their lives, without any evidence of how Oreo’s Law would do that. In fact, all Oreo’s Law does is set minimum standards. Shelters and rescue coalitions are free to add more expansive protections if they so choose. Moreover, Oreo’s Law will strengthen rescue groups, and lead to more collaborations of shelters and rescue groups throughout the state. According to Professor Bryant,

In addition to expanding the opportunities for animal adoption, rescue groups have opportunities at adoption events to educate members of the public about various animal-related topics such as development of local dog parks or where to find low-cost spay/neuter services. Rescue group presence in pet supply stores greatly increases public access to information that can reduce relinquishment to shelters. Group members regularly provide information about solutions to common problems such as inappropriate barking or urinating.

Finally, the greater confidence rescue groups have in their continued existence to perform their mission has resulted in increased networking among groups to solve problems or share such information as good deals on pet food and supplies, experiences with veterinarians, and proposed laws that affect rescue group activity. For instance, recently members of different cat rescue groups in California have shared information about and written letters in support of proposed laws to ban non-therapeutic declawing of cats and other animals. Those groups know firsthand the terrible consequences of cat declawing, and their input has been helpful to legislators considering bans.

Now, ten years after it went into effect, it is possible to say that the right of access provision in the Hayden Law was very important to the development of a vibrant network of animal rescue and adoption groups that function more efficiently and optimistically than they could when their ability to rescue animals from shelters was insecure. Animals have benefited directly from their life-saving activities and indirectly from the education and other services they provide.

These are all very positive features of a law that met vehement opposition while going through the legislative process. The stated bases for opposition are similar to those expressed by those who oppose Oreo’s Law: the risk of hoarding of shelter animals, the risk of dogs ending up in dog fighting circles, and increased risks to the public due to irresponsible release of unsuitable dogs to adopters. Despite such dire predictions of increased incidence of public harm and cruelty to animals as a result of passing the right of access provision in the Hayden Law, there is no evidence of increased incidence of either.

Truth be told, Oreo’s Law will undermine Jane Hoffman’s dictatorship over rescue groups in New York City. If Oreo’s law passes, every rescue group in New York will enjoy the privilege she now possesses, and her stranglehold on power will disappear. But that is a good thing and should be actively encouraged. Hoffman’s power in New York is an accident of history and serves no needed purpose. Throughout the nation, there are communities which have greater rates of lifesaving than New York City and have achieved No Kill without a self-serving middle man wielding arbitrary power. They have no intermediary such as Hoffman dictating which rescue groups can save animals, while taking a cut of the funding available to those groups. The Mayor’s Alliance is Jane Hoffman’s personal fiefdom which now exists to serve Jane Hoffman, and not the animals of NYC.

Finally, Allen closes her opposition to Oreo’s Law by suggesting that despite the killing, despite documented cases of shelters killing animals while rescue groups are turned away, Oreo’s Law is not even needed. She says “there is every indication that in New York[,] public shelters are already placing animals with rescuers.”

I love New York City as much as the next person. I used to live in upstate New York and took every opportunity to visit when I could. And since moving to California in 2004, I continue to visit New York City every year. But I am not deluded, like some New Yorkers, who believe that New York City is New York State; that beyond its borders is a vast emptiness that does not matter. Sure, in New York City, animal control does transfer some animals to some rescuers, if Hoffman approves. Yet, that is definitely not true throughout the state, and certainly not enough even within NYC.

I also ran an animal control shelter in the state, the first to achieve a No Kill community. I know firsthand that many New York shelters aren’t doing nearly enough to save the lives of the animals they are pledged to protect, at the same time they turn away the lifesaving assistance of rescue groups who would offer the animals they kill a lifesaving alternative. Oreo’s Law would help remedy this tragic result.

But what does Allen care? She got her dog back, who was given the second chance by a rescue group she would deny Oreo, and insists on denying to the thousands of other animals like Oreo.

The Emperor Has No Clothes

In the end, neither Sayres, nor Hoffman truly fear that the legislation will put animals in harm’s way, because such a claim is nonsensical. Rescue groups take animals out of harm’s way by saving them from certain death. What Sayres and Hoffman fear is a loss of power, and they have now have a puppet—Laura Allen—as a mouthpiece for their cause.

The grassroots of this movement—the small non-profits which do the lion’s share of life-saving and would be able to do much more if not hindered by those in positions of power—must demand the rights that are their due, and which are the animals’ saving grace.

As I write in my book Irreconcilable Differences: The Battle for the Heart & Soul of America’s Animal Shelters,

The goal of every social movement is legislation to gain and then protect the rights of its members or the focus of its efforts, and the No Kill movement must stop acting like it is the exception. The suffrage movement wasn’t just seeking discretionary permission from elections officials to vote, an ability that could be taken away. Its goal was winning the right to vote, a right guaranteed in law. The civil rights movement wasn’t just seeking the discretionary ability to sit at the front of the bus or to eat at the same lunch counters (and so much more). Its goal was winning the right to do so, a right guaranteed in law. The movement for marriage equality isn’t just seeking the discretionary opportunity to marry despite sexual orientation. Its goal is winning the right to do so, a right guaranteed in law. Because without legal rights, one’s fate is contingent on who the election official is, who the restaurant owner is, and who the mayor is. And just as quickly as permission is given, it can be taken away.

However, whenever legislation is passed empowering the grassroots, those in power lose out, including those who claim to desire the very things the legislation seeks to create. In the case of people like Sayres and Hoffman, they claim to want rescue groups to be able to save animals, but only so long as they take a cut of the funding and maintain the imperious power to decide who lives, who dies, who does the saving, and when. They know and fear the truth: That once the power shifts to the rescue groups, animals will be saved in skyrocketing numbers and the sky will not fall as a result. And we will see more clearly than ever that the emperors have no clothes. And neither Sayres nor Hoffman will allow that to happen without a fight.

Learn more at: www.YESonOreosLaw.com

The Animals of NYS vs. Ed Sayres, ASPCA

Dear friends and colleagues,

The animals in New York State shelters need your help. Recently, the ASPCA killed an abused dog named Oreo, despite an offer by a No Kill shelter to save her life. In response, the New York State Legislature is now considering a law that would make it illegal for any shelter or pound to kill an animal if a legitimate rescue group is willing to save the animal’s life. But the ASPCA wants to kill the proposed law, the way it killed Oreo, for which the new law is named.

We can never bring Oreo back, but we can make sure this never happens again in any New York shelter. Oreo’s Law will save thousands of dogs and puppies, cats and kittens (including feral cats), rabbits, and pocket pets currently being killed in shelters despite rescue groups willing to save them. And it won’t cost taxpayers a dime! But Ed Sayres, the President of the ASPCA, is opposing the law and threatening to kill it.

While the animal loving people of New York State flood the legislature with calls of support, while the most progressive voices in the companion animal movement have embraced and endorsed Oreo’s Law, and while rescuers anxiously await legislation that will empower them to save the lives of thousands of animals every year, the leader of the nation’s wealthiest SPCA stands alone in defiant opposition, thumbing his nose at them all.

Unable to publicly admit that his opposition stems only from the fact that he doesn’t want the public reminded about Oreo’s killing, Sayres has couched the ASPCA’s opposition as concern that the animals the law would save would actually be better off dead, arguing that rescue groups might be animal hoarders or dog fighters in disguise. Day in and day out, these rescuers show tremendous courage and compassion—visiting what is often the one place on earth hardest for them to go as animal lovers: their local shelters. And yet they go back, again and again. They endure the hostile treatment. They endure the heartbreak of seeing the animals destined for the needle. They endure having to jump through unnecessary and arbitrary hurdles set by shelter directors who are holding the animals they want to save hostage. They endure having to look the other way at abuse of other animals, because if they don’t, if they speak out, they will be barred from saving any animals. And this law would make their lives easier—their work less difficult. It would empower them, tip the balance more in their favor, and lessen their daily burden. That the President of the ASPCA would fail to support such a law, or worse, would dare oppose it by claiming that these dedicated, hard working rescuers are, in reality, dog fighters and hoarders in disguise not only is offensive, but a betrayal of these selfless, compassionate individuals—and  a betrayal to the animals whose lives the law would save.

Right now, one man—Oreo’s killer—has indicated he intends to thwart the will of thousands of rescuers, and millions of New York animal lovers, by taking a position which—were he to be successful in killing the legislation—would sacrifice the lives of thousands of animals every year in the State of New York.

Right now, one man—who has consistently betrayed the cause which he is paid half a million dollars a year to champion—is abusing his power by choosing to condemn thousands of animals every year to death as a personal vendetta against those trying to prevent others from needlessly killing animals, like he did with his egregious and indefensible killing of an abused dog.

Right now, one man—who has sullied the name of the ASPCA beyond any recognition—has basically said of the animals of New York State dependant on this bill for their very lives, the ethical equivalent of ‘Let them die!’

We cannot allow this to happen. Your letters, e-mails, and telephone numbers are needed now. Please visit www.YESonOreosLaw.com for what you can do to help end killing in New York State shelters. Even if you do not live in New York, your support is crucial. Because, as one supporter from Texas, noted: “Where New York goes, so goes the nation.”

Ed Sayres Threatens To Kill Oreo’s Law

Henry Bergh, the founder of the ASPCA, is rolling in his grave. The man currently sitting in the chair he once occupied, heading the organization he founded, is not only thwarting his dream of an organization whose mission is to save the lives of animals, he is actively undermining it. As animal lovers approached Ed Sayres, the current President of the ASPCA, to cease opposition to Oreo’s Law, pending New York State legislation named after an abused dog he ordered killed despite a rescue alternative, Sayres refused, turning his back on both the animals and their rescuers.

His refusal comes after animal lovers working on the legislation made a number of concessions—each designed to eliminate Sayres’ opposition—by removing all reference to Oreo and even giving him credit for the law, in exchange for his support. But Sayres refused, holding firm in opposition to the bill in spite of the body count, underscoring that his association with the ASPCA has afforded him friends in high places, and that when the legislation comes to a vote, he will simply see to it that it is killed, as easily as he needlessly killed Oreo.

Who was Oreo?

In New York City, a one-year old dog named Oreo was intentionally thrown off a sixth floor Brooklyn roof top by her abuser. Oreo sustained two broken legs and a fractured rib. Oreo also appears to have been beaten in the past—several of the neighbors in the building where Oreo lived reported hearing the sounds of the dog being hit. The ASPCA nursed her back to health and arrested the perpetrator. They also dubbed her the “miracle dog.”

The miracle was short-lived. According to the ASPCA, when Oreo recovered from her injuries, she started to show aggression. After a series of temperament tests, the ASPCA made the decision to kill her. The New York Times reported the story the day before Oreo’s scheduled execution. A sanctuary in New York offered to take Oreo, explaining that they had experience rehabilitating dogs deemed aggressive and offering her lifetime care, including plenty of socialization and walks if the rehabilitation was not successful. They were ignored, hung up on and lied to. And the ASPCA chose to kill the dog instead. That afternoon, Oreo laid dead, the victim not of her former abuser, but of an overdose of poison from a bottle marked “Fatal-Plus,” at the hands of a shelter bureaucrat, and at the behest of Sayres.

Following the furor that erupted over Oreo’s killing, Micah Kellner and Tom Duane, New York State legislators, introduced a bill to prevent animals from being killed by shelters when there is a lifesaving alternative offered by rescue groups. “As a dog owner and a foster parent for an animal rescue group, I was heartbroken to learn that Oreo was [killed]. When a humane organization volunteers their expertise in difficult cases, a shelter should work with them to the fullest extent possible,” said Kellner. “I am hopeful that Oreo’s Law will ensure that no animal is ever put to death if there is a responsible alternative.” (A few weeks later Ed Sayres, Oreo’s killer, did it again, killing a dog named Max a rescue group had offered to save.)

No Kill Movement United Behind Oreo’s Law

Not only have thousands of animal lovers contacted Kellner and Duane thanking them for introducing Oreo’s Law, but the leaders of the No Kill movement have unanimously embraced it as well. Louise Holton, Trap-Neuter-Release (TNR) pioneer, Alley Cat Allies co-founder, and head of a national cat rescue group, was the latest No Kill leader to embrace Oreo’s Law, urging New York legislators to pass it.

She joins:

• National leaders including myself at the No Kill Advocacy Center and  Michael Mountain, founder of Best Friends;
• The most successful shelter directors in the country including Abigail Smith, the Executive Director of the Tompkins County NY SPCA, Bonney Brown, the Director of the Nevada Humane Society, and Susanne Kogut of the Charlottesville SPCA;
• Animal rights proponents including Priscilla Feral at Friends of Animals;
• Media including Mike Fry of Animal Wise Radio;
• The nation’s top animal law professors including Taimie Bryant, UCLA Law Professor and author of California’s Hayden Law, Rebecca Huss, the court appointed guardian of the Michael Vick dogs, and Joan Schaffner, co-host of the No Kill Conference and editor of a textbook on litigating animal disputes;
• Rescue groups throughout New York State including Pets Alive, the shelter and sanctuary which offered to save Oreo, Empty Cages Collective, a rescue group in New York City; and,
• Animal advocates across the country.

And No Kill pioneer Richard Avanzino, the father of the modern No Kill movement, calls right of shelter access key to a No Kill nation.

One Organization Stands Opposed

As it now stands, only one organization has publicly come out in opposition to Oreo’s Law—and that is the ASPCA. While the animal loving people of New York State flood the legislature with calls of support, while the most progressive voices in the companion animal movement have embraced and endorsed Oreo’s Law, and while rescuers anxiously await legislation that will empower them to save the lives of thousands of animals every year, the leader of the nation’s wealthiest SPCA stands alone in defiant opposition, thumbing his nose at them all.

Unable to publicly admit that his opposition stems only from the fact that he doesn’t want the public reminded about Oreo’s killing, Sayres has couched the ASPCA’s opposition as concern that the animals the law would save would actually be better off dead, arguing that rescue groups might be animal hoarders or dog fighters in disguise. Day in and day out, these rescuers show tremendous courage and compassion—visiting what is often the one place on earth hardest for them to go as animal lovers: their local shelters. And yet they go back, again and again. They endure the hostile treatment. They endure the heartbreak of seeing the animals destined for the needle. They endure having to jump through unnecessary and arbitrary hurdles set by shelter directors who are holding the animals they want to save hostage. They endure having to look the other way at abuse of other animals, because if they don’t, if they speak out, they will be barred from saving any animals. And this law would make their lives easier—their work less difficult. It would empower them, tip the balance more in their favor, and lessen their daily burden. That the President of the ASPCA would fail to support such a law, or worse, would dare oppose it by claiming that these dedicated, hard working rescuers are, in reality, dog fighters and hoarders in disguise not only is offensive, but a betrayal of these selfless, compassionate individuals—and  a betrayal to the animals whose lives the law would save.

In fact, Best Friends Animal Society asked New York State rescue groups whether they supported the bill, and whether they have seen animals killed by shelters despite their offers to save them, and the overwhelming response was “Yes.” (When Best Friends presented these findings to Ed Sayres, however, he dismissed them as irrelevant.)

Moreover, over ten years experience in California with virtually identical legislation shows that these concerns are misplaced: the fear mongering about hoarders and dog fighters that also occurred when the bill was pending in California did not materialize. And there are already protections built into the law to ensure that this does not occur.

A Face Saving Overture to the ASPCA

Nonetheless, activists working with Kellner’s Office approached the ASPCA this week, through Best Friends as an intermediary, in the hopes of removing Sayres’ opposition to the bill, and offered additional (though unneeded) protections and a face-saving change in the name of the law in exchange for the ASPCA’s support, including:

Language suspending “any organization that has an officer or board member who has been convicted of a statute having as its primary effect the prevention or punishment of neglect and/or cruelty or dog fighting until such time as that officer or board member is no longer an officer or board member of the organization.”

Language suspending any organization during the time “such charges are pending in a court of law, but not yet adjudicated until such time as the case is adjudicated either in favor of the organization, at which time the suspension will be lifted, or if adjudicated against the organization, until such time as the officer or board member is no longer with the organization.”

In addition, proponents offered to reintroduce the bill without reference to Oreo as “The Animal Shelter Lifesaving & Fiscal Responsibility Act,” since the bill would not only save the lives of animals, but would save taxpayers from paying to hold, kill, and discard the bodies of the animals New York shelters kill, by giving the animals—and the costs—to rescue groups. They also agreed to cease all reference to Oreo as it relates to this bill. They offered to allow the ASPCA to take credit for the law. Finally, they offered that if the ASPCA did not want their support for the newly introduced bill, they would not be publicly involved. In other words, activists offered Ed Sayres the opportunity to do the right thing.

As he did with Oreo, he refused. Ed Sayres firmly and unequivocally rejected the offer, and reiterated that the ASPCA had friends in high places and simply would kill the bill—regardless of how many animals are also killed in the process.

The People of the State of New York vs. Edwin J. Sayres

Right now, one man—Oreo’s killer—has indicated he intends to thwart the will of thousands of rescuers, and millions of New York animal lovers, by taking a position which—were he to be successful in killing the legislation—would sacrifice the lives of thousands of animals every year in the State of New York.

Right now, one man—who has consistently betrayed the cause which he is paid half a million dollars a year to champion—is abusing his power by choosing to condemn thousands of animals every year to death as a personal vendetta against those trying to prevent others from needlessly killing animals, like he did with his egregious and indefensible killing of an abused dog.

Right now, one man—who has sullied the name of the ASPCA beyond any recognition—has basically said of the animals of New York State dependant on this bill for their very lives, the ethical equivalent of ‘Let them die!’

This will not stand.

“It is time for all of us to lift our voices for those who cannot speak for themselves.”

—Gail Longstaff, President, No More Homeless Pets KC, announcing support for Oreo’s Law

What can you do to help? Go to www.yesonoreoslaw.com or click here.

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