----- Original Message -----
From: Animal Advocates Society of B.C.
To: letters@thenownewspaper.com
Sent: Tuesday, October 22, 2002 2:28 PM
Subject: Fw:

The Letters Editor,
The Surrey Now

99.99% of people, if asked who is to blame for pet overpopulation and for crowded SPCA shelters, would answer "irresponsible owners". Could that be because the SPCA has told this to their media buddies who have repeated it, ad nauseum, for decades. The SPCA is dissembling and the media is lazy. Did Surrey Now writer, Corry Anderson Fennel, ask a single hard question of long-time Surrey SPCA manager, Hugh Nichols? What about Nichols and the Surrey SPCA's long, well paid, job history of "disposing" of the animals of all these irresponsible people? Did Nichols ever battle for control of breeding laws in Surrey? Did Nichols ever battle the BC SPCA to adopt an ethics guideline to stop the breeding and selling of dogs and cats by SPCA employees? That's called feeding your own industry and the pets that SPCA employees breed and sell are the competition for the dogs and cats the Surrey SPCA puts down for lack of homes. Nichols does have one valid complaint about the lack of volunteers. All the women who used to dedicate themselves to trying to rescue dogs from the SPCA got so disillusioned and disgusted that they went and started their own rescue organizations.

Judy Stone
President, Animal Advocates Society of BC

More on the Surrey SPCA: http://www.animaladvocates.com/dudley.htm