From: Jeri-Lyn Ratzlaff
To: mayorcampbell@city.vancouver.bc.ca
Cc: Judy Stone (E-mail)
Sent: Monday, January 13, 2003 1:01 PM
Subject: another case of abrogration of duty by VCP and SPCA

January 13, 2003

Mayor Larry Campbell and Council,
The City of Vancouver
453 West 12th Avenue,
Vancouver, BC, V5Y 1V4

Re: German shepherd dog "Lily" at 1172 East 14th Ave:

Dear Mayor Campbell and Councillors,

A report of dog neglect has been sent to Animal Advocates Society of BC by a concerned neighbour of the dog. In an e-mail to AAS, this informant said that she contacted both the SPCA Vancouver Branch and the Vancouver City Pound about an 8-month female German shepherd named Lily.

According to the informant she made two phone calls to the SPCA in August and September 0f 2002 and at least one phone call to the VCP. She gave the following information to these agencies with these results:

Information regarding public safety and humane animal care:

Informant reported that this dog is neglected, socially isolated, lives enclosed under the stairs in the backyard when not in the yard, and seems to be confused and anxious when people are around.
From the informant’s observations as well as her many conversations with several neighbours, Lily doesn’t get the physical exercise that a German shepherd requires and she barks all the time. (Lily’s owner says he walks her at night, but AAS has found that that is the stock answer almost all dog neglectors give.)

This dog is described as showing aggressive behaviour and neighbours are fearful of this dog getting loose and attacking someone.
The consensus among the neighbours is that this dog is owned for the purpose of guarding the owner’s property without the owner providing a minimum standard of social enrichment (see attachment: BC SPCA Standards of Care of Dogs Guidelines) that this dog has a right to.
Note: Since the informant’s phone calls to the SPCA and the VCP, she says that a visitor to the owner’s home was bitten by the dog on December 8th, 2002.

Responses from the SPCA and the VCP:

SPCA said they couldn’t do anything and told Anne to call the pound.

VCP said that they couldn’t do anything because Lily was too young to be trained, and that it was "fine" for Lily to be alone in the yard.
Neither of these statements is true and indicates a serious degree of ignorance or indifference.
Please tell me who is responsible for public safety if not the VCP? And who is responsible for pet welfare and making sure an animal’s basic needs are met if not the SPCA?

How many phone calls need to be made and how many letters need to be sent to the SPCA and the VCP before Lily is rescued? How many people have to be bitten or attacked by this dog before either the SPCA or the VCP take action?

And what will be the most likely outcome of action taken? Lily will be killed because she will by this time be labeled a vicious dog, unable to be rehabilitated, after languishing for countless months locked up at the pound. The public, especially parents, won’t feel safe because irresponsible pet owners are allowed to abuse and neglect their animals, often keeping them for the sole purpose of having a guard dog. Lily’s owner may get a fine, but may very well get another dog that may not be any better cared for.

In light of this disturbing scenario, it’s ironic that a VCP former director was quoted in a 2001 Reader’s Digest article titled ‘Dangerous Dogs' http://www.readersdigest.ca/mag/2001/01/dogs.html on this very issue: ‘It’s no mystery why they attack people,’ says Barbara Fellnermayr, manager of Vancouver Animal Control. ‘Owners train them to be aggressive, neglect and abuse them, and leave these otherwise highly social animals isolated and locked up in the backyard." And yet with the fate of Lily and vulnerable citizens hanging in the balance, the VCP doesn’t heed the words of its one of its managers.

We believe as many others do, that animal control agencies should have as their mandate the responsibility for the "safe harbour of all the community’s unwanted animals and protection of its people" (HSUS, Animal Sheltering Magazine May/June 2002).

Please tell us why neither the Vancouver SPCA, which City staff have said is "taking care of these problem dogs", nor Vancouver City Animal Control, feels obligated to act on behalf of Lily and the public. I don’t think Vancouver’s citizens should have to wait for a young child to be bitten by Lily before she is removed from a negligent owner.

Animal welfare and rights advocates are confident that the future of municipal control agencies is not to only protect the public as Carl Friedman, director of San Francisco Animal Care and Control says, but they will be expected to be "very animal welfare-conscious" (HSUS, Animal Sheltering Magazine, May/June 2002).

Even without a stronger overlap between public safety and animal rights, neither the SPCA nor the VCP is fulfilling their current mandate. The SPCA is negligent in not responding to the social and physical needs of this dog. We don’t see how it can ignore Lily’s plight and still claim to ‘speak for those who can’t speak for themselves’. The VCP is negligent in not protecting the public. And we see no humane reason to wait for a dog to become increasingly more aggressive before a community can count on you to take preventative action to ensure the safety of its citizens.

We urge the City to make the SPCA or its own Animal Control do something humane for this young dog before she is ruined past rehabilitation and before she seriously injures a person and is then destroyed, as is too frequently the course of events. We believe that taxpaying animal-lovers in Vancouver would sooner pay to prevent the ruin of innocent dogs than pay to euthanize them.

Please do your job and take appropriate action to prevent further neglect to this dog and to prevent the risk of increased aggression and dog-bites to the community.

And please tell us what action is taken regarding Lily. The VCP and the SPCA both have, or should have, records of the complaints made. If Lily is seized by either the VCP or the SPCA we would like to know so that we may offer our help in her rehabilitation and rehoming. We do not want Lily to be killed or disappear because we have brought her plight to your attention.

Sincerely,
Jeri-Lyn Ratzlaff
Research Coordinator, AAS of BC

(Note: the informant’s name may be supplied on request, but only on the condition of anonymity.)

The City of Vancouver said in 2001 that it was not necessary for it to adopt humane treatment of dogs bylaws because the BC SPCA will address citizen’s concerns about isolated yard dogs by applying these guidelines.