News from Around the Country
Increasing redemption rates, mission change in Houston, veterinarians should “do no harm,” One Nation Under Dog, giving away the store, and hey, can’t we all just get along? (Did I really say that? Yes!)
Increasing redemption rates, mission change in Houston, veterinarians should “do no harm,” One Nation Under Dog, giving away the store, and hey, can’t we all just get along? (Did I really say that? Yes!)
Today is the day of the meeting between Wayne Pacelle and Pit Bull advocates in Las Vegas, ostensibly designed to avoid a repeat of the Wilkes County Massacre. We are all watching to see who will continue to give voice to our values and aspirations, and who will prove themselves irrelevant as we continue our march toward a No Kill nation.
That damnable Wayne Pacelle, PETA defends slaughter, Tompkins County honored, Houston recap, rethinking animal control contracts, and Gina the cat.
Today is April 1. In my humble view, it is one of the most important days in the history of animal sheltering, right up there with the day Henry Bergh founded the first SPCA in North America. Fifteen years ago today, after months of negotiation, Richard Avanzino, then President of the San Francisco Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals signed the Adoption Pact, a memorandum of understanding between the SPCA and the city shelter that guaranteed a home for every healthy dog and cat in San Francisco. Each and every healthy dog and cat who entered the city’s pound would be saved – no matter how many there were or how long it took.
The blog I write is about reforming animal sheltering in the United States. It is about ending the systematic killing of animals in these pounds. But this particular blog isn’t about sheltering. This isn’t about the battle between the No Kill philosophy and its eventual conquest over regressive, kill-oriented approaches. This is about something more nefarious. This is about Ingrid Newkirk. This is about an animal killing, arrogant, disturbed person. And enough is enough.
Another grisly year at PETA as 95% of dogs and cats are killed; Best Friends says it is time to hit the reset button on the HSUS policy of supporting the systematic killing of Pit Bulls in shelters; free copies of Redemption to elected officials, staff reporters for newspapers, and animal control directors; a turnaround in Los Angeles over spay/neuter vouchers; and building a No Kill Houston.
The Los Angeles City Council has moved to reinstate a spay/neuter voucher program the animal control agency eliminated in a round of budget cuts, calling it “key in creating a No Kill city and saving money.” The motion also calls for “a report on the success of the [mandatory] spay/neuter ordinance.” Both efforts are largely meaningless and will ensure that animals continue to be needlessly killed.
In 1993, both the ASPCA and HSUS opposed a No Kill San Francisco. The ASPCA called it a “hoax” and the HSUS spent years trying to derail it through data distortion and a deliberate campaign of misinformation. Now, both the ASPCA and HSUS are trying to hinder success yet again. If ever agencies were blind to their own interests and bent on their own destruction, it is HSUS and the ASPCA.
Los Angeles to kill more poor people’s pets, small humane society shows HSUS how to do things right, ASPCA and HSUS fearful of a No Kill San Francisco, and Building a No Kill Houston. More shelter news from around the country…
The following were my comments at a March 12, 2009 meeting of the San Francisco Animal Welfare Commission, as part of its “exploration of a policy that would ensure that no adoptable animal (including those that need medical and behavioral intervention but would be adoptable after that) is [killed] in San Francisco shelters.”