THE BC SPCA - UNCHAINED AND DANGEROUS! Part Seven: Who is ultimately responsible?
The board of directors of the BC SPCA. The board has a clearly defined legal duty to control the actions of its executive. Some of the current members of the BC SPCA board of directors were around when the SPCA avoided cruelty prevention thereby condoning and approving of puppymills, and they are still around to condone and approve of the misuse of the Act.
In January of this year AAS had a phone conversation with the then President Rick Sargent, in which we warned him of the illegality of some seizures. We hoped he would put a stop to it because we did not want to see the SPCA destroyed. We warned him that one seizure may prove to be a case of malicious prosecution. He replied that Crown had accepted charges and that was good enough for him. We suggested that Crown may have been misled, but he was not interested. What did please him is that all the seizures had resulted in increased revenues.
This is the same board that has not produced the audited financial statements that the Act requires it to. It is the same board that permits its executive to mislead the public with false p.r. announcements. It is the same board that still allows the sale of unsterilized animals. It is the same board that is spending no, or very little, money on community spay/neuter. It is the same board that permitted the latest deal with Petcetera, the mass marketer of exotics and other caged creatures. It is the same board that got rid of its previous CEO and then paid him for almost a year, but because it won't produce audited statements, there is no way for donators to know what he was paid in settlement. Or the Vancouver SPCA CEO before him.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Fisheries, which oversees the PCA Act, is also ultimately responsible. So far, it has defended the SPCA, even permitting it to not provide audited statements. If the SPCA board of directors is unwilling to make its executive act honestly, then we must make the government do it.
See also:
http://www.animaladvocates.com/Watchdog/Petcetera.htm
http://www.animaladvocates.com/Watchdog/SPCAandFOI.htm
http://www.animaladvocates.com/Watchdog/ViolenceLink.htm
http://www.animaladvocates.com/Watchdog/SPCAfinances.htm