The BC SPCA Now  2014

Since Animal Advocates began documenting the BC SPCA on the AAS website in 2001, the SPCA has made some improvements. But it still hypocritically says "We speak for those who cannot speak for themselves" while it silences many by killing them. Nor does it give a voice to many chained or tethered dogs because it leaves them on their chains. The SPCA does not answer questions from Animal Advocates so we are forced to make this list of changes based on the information we are given by animal-lovers all over BC and our own research.

Not one thing in this list happened without prior bad publicity (links to examples provided soon):

  1. Stopped electrocuting dogs to death using cheap uncalibrated Electrothanator machines which caused terrible suffering and the use of which was cruel according to the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, the act the SPCA used on other people
  2. Stopped new employees from breeding and selling dogs and cats as a side job (AAS internet campaign)
  3. Stopped its employees who were allowed to go on breeding more dogs (while they were also making money by killing many dogs while working at the SPCA), from surgically mutilating the dogs they bred and sold (AAS internet campaign)
  4. Stopped using gas boxes (Campaign in Victoria by a BC SPCA past President)
  5. Started making puppymill seizures (AAS internet campaign)
  6. Stopped "killing for cash" (AAS internet campaign)
  7. Began pre-sales sterilization (AAS internet campaign)
  8. Stopped seizing healthy animals without a warrant (as far as we know) (AAS internet campaign)
  9. May have stopped telling the media that a person is a "hoarder" when that has not been proved (AAS internet campaign)
  10. Stopped killing so many seized animals (AAS internet campaign)
  11. Began producing financial statements for the BC Charities Registry (Media investigation and articles)
  12. May have stopped selling seized horses through auction meat-houses (After AAS's internet campaign it sent out a press release that it was "adopting out" horses) (AAS internet campaign)
  13. Stopped killing so many feral cats by refusing to take them, meaning all the money for the rescue expenses had to be paid by the little cat rescuers
  14. Said it had a dog rehabilitation program (after an AAS internet campaign and many stories in the media), but kills dogs anyway without enough time being given to the dog
  15. Said it won't kill for space (but it possibly still does)
  16. Said it would only kill "unadoptable" animals (but justifies killing many animals by simply saying the animal wasn't "adoptable".
  17. Said it would seize dogs for psychological distress (it may not have been able to do this)
  18. Stopped boiling live crabs as a fundraiser (AAS internet campaign which attracted media attention Canada-wide and the Sea Shepherd Society)
  19. Said it only kills animals for the same reasons no-kill groups do, implying that it is no-kill. AAS's long experience with other rescue groups is that they only humanely put down animals whose lives can't be saved by any intervention or any medical means (AAS internet campaign)
  20. Stopped serving only factory-farmed meat at Paws for a Cause, its biggest annual event (AAS internet campaign and others)
  21. Stopped holding fundraisers in pet stores that sell puppymill dogs (AAS internet campaign)
  22. Stopped taking money from pest control companies to kill raccoons for them (AAS internet campaign)
  23. Stopped saying that they receive no government money (AAS internet campaign)

But there areas that are still in need of improvement:

  • Its p.r. misleads its donors and the public about what it is doing about chained or tethered dogs (SPCA's chained dog campaign p.r.);
  • In still kills feral cats;
  • It still sells dogs to people without home checks or proper screening and when behaviour problems arise, it will not always help the new owner, putting the owner through the misery of putting the dog down;
  • It sells animals without doing follow-up phone calls;
  • It still sells dogs to people who make a yard dog of it;
  • It still is killing many cats on spurious grounds of "health" or "behaviour";
  • It began making seizures under the PCA Act, but too frequently the animals seized are killed by the SPCA or fare worse under the SPCA than they did under their owners;
  • Its spokespersons make untruthful statements to the media and the public;
  • It is still actively pursuing dog catching/disposal contracts with BC municipalities;
  • As far as we know it still permits branches to sell meat at SPCA fundraisers although a campaign led by Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Society forced it to call off a crab-boiling fundraiser.

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