The current kill room at PETA’s headquarters. The room is euphemistically called the “exam room” by PETA leadership. No exam is done for purposes of placement or, if they are sick, treatment. No animal who enters the exam room ever comes out alive. As a PETA employee told me, “They would take the animals into that room and they would be euthanized: A litter of kittens, sometimes a mother with kittens: they were put in that room and once you went in that room, you never came out.” It’s time to force open the doors and let the light of public scrutiny in.
On behalf of the No Kill Advocacy Center, I have asked the Commissioner of the Virginia Department of Agriculture to issue regulations requiring shelters in Virginia to maintain and provide records to the public that cover when and how each animal was taken in, why the animal was taken in, the condition of each animal, what attempts were made to reunite the animal with the family, the kinds of care and treatment each animal received, the disposition of each animal, and if the animal was killed, when and why the animal was killed.
A copy of the petition is available by clicking here.
The petition is in a response to PETA—which is licensed in Virginia as a shelter—killing over 90% of the animals, with no effort to find them homes, stealing Maya, a happy and healthy dog, from her porch while her family was out, and killing her that very day, and a history of lying to people in order to acquire and then kill their animals.
As I write in the petition for rulemaking,
“We believe that by passing the requested regulations, organizations will be less likely to abuse state benefits—benefits such as their ability to acquire the controlled substances used to kill Maya and others—to the detriment of the animals of the Commonwealth and the people who love them:
“We are asking you to pass regulations that will protect families in Virginia, protect animals, assist state regulators in monitoring the activities of its licensees, and provide taxpayers with the information they need to be informed citizens: As Justice Louis Brandeis once wrote, ‘sunlight is: the best of disinfectants.'”
The Commissioner of VDACS “directed staff to prepare and submit” the petition for consideration. If you live in Virginia, you have until Monday to write in support of the No Kill Advocacy Center petition. Your voice makes a difference.
You can do so by clicking here.
If you do not live in Virginia, please share it with those who do.
For those who want to learn more about why PETA kills, click here.