On October 10th, 2003, three officers of the BC SPCA, Eileen Drever, Senior Animal Protection Officer, Shawn Eccles, Chief Animal Protection Officer, and Charlie Leung, manager and inspector, Richmond SPCA, appeared at the home of Penny March and her husband Serge Belley and demanded entry to inspect their cat shelter, Forgotten Felines. Both Drever and Eccles are long-time SPCA employees.
In Ms March's words, she was intimidated into giving them permission to come in by being told that they had authority to search her entire property, although they provided no warrant. Drever repeatedly demanded that March show her picture ID even though Ms March and Mr Leung are very familiar with each other. In Ms March's words, they loudly stamped around, frightening both Ms March and the cats until Belley told them he would call the police if they did not leave.
Ms Drever said several times that the cats would be better off dead. She gave Ms March an official 'Order' which instructed:
Provide veterinary care when animals exhibit signs of injury, pain, illness or suffering. Drever specified two cats out of 150 in the shelter that the she said had to be seen by a vet, one of which was a cat that was sick when received from the SPCA and was being treated by March already, the other was given a clean bill of health by March's vet.
Provide for animals placed in group housing the opportunity to withdraw from each other. The shelter has many cubbies for cats to withdraw into but not to be caged in (except for ill cats under treatment).
When explaining the order to March, Drever told March that the feral cats should be caged. In other words, the SPCA instructed March, on penalty of seizure of all her cats, that she keep her cats in cages - like they do at the SPCA. It is well-known to those familiar with cat behaviour, that caging causes a rapid decline in physical and mental health for cats, causing them death by disease (most commonly upper respiratory diseases) and death by despair (they stop eating and their livers shut down). The SPCA kills many cats in its grim, inhumane facilities because of this. The order also stipulated that a vet inspect Forgotten Feline's shelter and all its cats within 7 days. It threatened that failure to comply to the Order within 24 hours could result in legal action, including seizure of March's animals, and/or criminal charges pursuant to the PCA Act. In plain words, the SPCA was threatening to give Ms March a criminal record and seize her cats, keeping them at an SPCA in tiny cages, possibly killing some as the SPCA has in the past with seized animals. (See "We do not euthanize animals for lack of space". The Vernon SPCA proves that a lie http://www.animaladvocates.com/cgi-bin/newsroom.pl/read/3273)
WHO IS FORGOTTEN FELINES?
March founded Forgotten Felines in October 2000, after more than a decade of doing cat rescue on her own, setting up a cat shelter in her house and property. She and volunteers work for free to humanely trap abandoned and feral cats all over the lower mainland, sterilizing and treating for disease, injury, rotten teeth and parasites. Where possible, March sets up feeding stations, but where there is no one to monitor a station, March brings the cats to the Forgotten Felines shelter where they are socialized and rehomed. Some cats need chronic and ongoing medical attention and some remain feral: those cats become permanent residents. All sick cats at Forgotten Feline receive medication and vet care.
March has up to 150 cats in her home and property. Two trailers are set up with individual cages that cats can choose to retire to but are not confined to (except the sickest while being treated). The trailers allow access to outdoors so all the cats are able to experience natural freedom and socializing should they choose. March and Belley have secured their yard so cats cannot leave, but the yard is planted with trees and shrubs with cat perches and sunning spots. Oak benches and garden chairs are for volunteers to sit and stroke cats and interact with them in a normal manner. Forgotten Felines is a well respected cat rescue organization doing a much better and more humane job than the SPCA itself.
The considerable expenses are met by March personally and by donations from cat-lovers who appreciate Forgotten Feline's true no-kill policy. A large body of volunteers help March to keep the shelter clean and to socialize the cats. Two of those volunteers are Barbara Yaffe, the Sun newspaper columnist, and her husband, Wilson Russell.
IS ANYONE IN CHARGE AT THE SPCA?
The right hand does not appear to know what the left hand is doing. Some SPCA branches actually give cats to March that would otherwise be put down for health or age reasons. The Vancouver, Burnaby, and Langley SPCAs have given March 3 to 4 cats a week for a year. So the BC SPCA was inspecting the condition of some of its own off-loaded cats that it would have killed. This begs the question: Is anyone in charge at the BC SPCA or is it in a state of mismanaged chaos?
The Manager of the Vancouver and Burnaby SPCAs came to inspect Forgotten Felines in July of this year and approved, telling March that he was impressed with how calm all her cats were and what a great set-up she had. The next day he released four cats to her. In fact, March was given 4 cats by the Vancouver SPCA the day before the SPCA raided her, three of which were going to be killed because they had upper respiratory colds, the great killer of cats in shelters.
March was instructed by the SPCA to have her shelter inspected by a vet within 7 days. Dr Dhillon of the Oak Animal Hospital came and praised the shelter fulsomely, saying that it was fantastic and that the cats all looked well looked after. He expressed the opinion that Drever should be investigated for saying that Penny's cats should be dead. We concur.
WHO WAS BEHIND THIS ABUSE OF POWER?
Karen Duncan of Vancouver Orphan Kitten Rescue went to the BC SPCA head office immediately after the raid and was told by Craig Daniell, BC SPCA CEO and Manager of Cruelty Investigations - the boss - that the complaint against Forgotten Felines was lodged by another cat rescue group with impeccable credentials. Who that may be is a story for another day, but earlier this year March had to enlist the help of the RCMP to stop another Richmond cat rescue group from defaming her and snooping around her property. This cat group is on very friendly terms with the SPCA.
Barbara Yaffe and Wilson Russell also went to the BC SPCA head offices in Vancouver the day of the raid and spoke to Ms Drever, who said several times more that the cats should all be dead. We can only say that Ms Drever has many years experience doing just that.
On October 30th Ms Yaffe met with Mr Daniell who said that the SPCA will be back, cannot be stopped, and that Drever, the inspector who March found most intimidating and arrogant, may very well attend again. Mr Daniell chose a course of hard-nosed stubbornness in the face of very questionable behaviour by his staff.
MARCH GETS A LAWYER AND FILES A COMPLAINT AGAINST THE SPCA WITH THE RCMP
On hearing what the SPCA had done to March, AAS advised her to retain the legal advice of lawyer Barbara Curran which March did. On October 31st March filed a complaint with the RCMP Complaints Commission about the SPCA's heavy-handed tactics and what may be a serious abuse of power. On October 31st, Curran faxed Craig Daniell, warning him that it was not a good idea for him to let Drever go back to Forgotten Felines.
WHO SPEAKS FOR THE SPCA?
If overweening employees are given free rein, as this case seems to indicate, they are being allowed to speak for the whole SPCA - for the Board of Directors and for the CEO. It is not as though Eileen Drever's penchant for questionable actions and words is not known to the SPCA. AAS has a file on Drever going back many years, and in January we warned CEO Daniell that she may discredit the SPCA. In our opinion she has, but it appears that the CEO approves of her behaviour. (We named other employees that we fully expect to make trouble for the SPCA if not controlled.) (See the story of the return of the Chilliwack puppymill dogs: http://www.animaladvocates.com/cgi-bin/newsroom.pl/read/3678)
THE SPCA KEEPS SHOOTING ITSELF IN THE FOOT
The market abhors a vacuum and the SPCA is creating an animal welfare vacuum because of many of its actions in the last three years. The SPCA is losing money disastrously: 2.6 million in 2001; 4.5 million in 2002; and 4.6 in 2003. The attack on Forgotten Felines is just one more instance of incredibly inept management decisions. March has told us that five people made donations to Forgotten Felines out of anger at the SPCA, one man coming to the door with $500, saying he was going to collect more from friends.
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