Letter: CAA a failure for animals

I have been an animal welfare advocate for over 40 years and have no affiliation with Companion Animal Alliance (CAA). Over the years I have volunteered on local, national and international issues to help ensure the humane treatment of animals.

Like many others in the community, I was hoping that CAA would succeed. Unfortunately even today, many people don’t even know about CAA because of the lack of advertising and fundraising efforts. Clearly, it has been a tremendous failure since its inception.

The only ones to be held accountable are the board of directors and those they hire to run the shelter. The first director was terminated within a short time, the second, in my opinion, wrongly let go, and now, the third director is a source of controversy.

If one chooses to read the recent 38-page investigation report with documentation and graphic photos regarding claims of cruel, inhumane and illegal activities at the shelter, they can judge for themselves. The report is public record.

Unless CAA reorganizes its board to include at least one additional veterinarian, perhaps one or two individuals from the rescue community, former director Hilton Cole and consider a new, less-controversial director, then I’m all for giving it back to Animal Control and Hilton Cole. Then, we can begin to the raise money for a new, badly needed facility, hire trained and caring staff and make our shelter a more-humane place for the animals.

Susan Aronson

animal welfare advocate

Baton Rouge

Comments

1) Comment by care4pets - 15/11/2012

Thanks to both factsonly and Phil for your comments. Could not agree more.

2) Comment by factsonly - 15/11/2012

Phil, Thank you. You are so right about the overpopulation of animals. If only people would spay/neuter and be responsible pet owners, the shelters would not be as full, and less wonderful, healthy, loving animals would be euthanized. You're right about the puppy mills which we've all been trying to crack down on for years, it's all about the money to them. If we could only educate more people to, Adopt, and not Shop, for their pets.

3) Comment by phil - 15/11/2012

I agree with this letter and have to imagine that Susan Aronson has done her homework on researching this issue, and I thank her for her volunteer work. I will add that taxpayers should be cautious when new organizations (nonprofit etc) are created that use tax funds, especially when they duplicate some existing services. I think the problem really is that there are too many pets and just not enough pet owners to feed them all. This has to be addressed before the real problem can be solved. Too many people, like those who run puppy mill etc, are in the pet business just for the cash and could care less about what happens to animals. Society needs to look at this issue very closely to solve this problem. Boarding animals inside shelters is not the overall answer to a larger problem.