The improvements at the SPCA were only made after some brave people complained in writing to the SPCA, would not stop complaining, went to the media and went to their City Hall.

That is what it took to make the Maple Ridge SPCA change from the anti-animal hole that it was to what Brigitta MacMillan describes above.

The changes were fought every inch of the way by the SPCA, until finally it had to improve or lose its contract and face increasing bad P.R. Bad P.R. and no contract = less money... just in case you didn't understand what drove the SPCA. Every opportunity to do real animal welfare (and every day for 30 years was an opportunity), was ground down under the SPCA's heel.

Brigitta's letters to the SPCA must have curdled their blood. Here was an SPCA anomaly - an intelligent volunteer who had all her facts and was not going to be placated by "head-patting" answers.

And then Gail Moerkerken added her intelligent determination and her business skills to her clear understanding of compassion and duty and the SPCA's fate in Maple Ridge was sealed. Gail was instrumental in forming a City Hall committee to look at the way animal control was being handled by the SPCA in Maple Ridge. Congratulations Gail and Brigitta for standing up for the animals in Maple Ridge and forcing this change.

Some of the cages at the Maple Ridge SPCA that Brigitta objected to....