WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH PEOPLE?
That’s not really a traditional journalistic headline, but it is the prevailing reaction to the story of a cat allowed to die within a wall of the Dallas Animal Services shelter.
The cat escaped from a cage in the lost/found area at the shelter, went through a hole in the ceiling (ceiling tiles had been removed), fell into the space between walls and stayed there, meowing, growing weaker without food and water until it died. It was neither an instant death nor a quiet death.
People heard the cries of this cat for days. They knew it was there. Supervisors knew. Workers knew. Nobody did anything. Nobody knocked a hole in the drywall and saved the cat. The wall was opened only after the poor cat’s carcass began to stink up the area.
What is the matter with people?
We may be about to find out what’s wrong with the heartless people who let this happen.
A Dallas County grand jury has been questioning Dallas Animal Services employees about this cruelty. Maybe there will be charges – after all, animal cruelty is against the law, even in Dallas. Surely this meets the criteria.
What would motivate someone to leave a suffering animal in such an awful spot? What kind of heart beats in that person? Those people?
Sure, there are caring employees on the animal services payroll, but there appear, also, to be some cruel and despicable don’t-give-a-damn jerks.
This incident represents more than the death of one cat in a facility designed with a euthanasia room.
This incident represents a great betrayal of the citizens who worked so hard to make this modern shelter a reality, a genuine, quality example of what a city can do. A determined core of citizens labored long to give the city a place that would represent its heart -- the kindness and decency that Dallas, with its high murder rate and notorious corruption, so often fails to exhibit.
This incident is also a betrayal of the Dallas Animal Services Commission, formed by the city council to advise elected council members on facts and nuances of an area in which some of them are sadly unaware. I've seen the looks on commission faces as city employees tried to "explain" away crises and challenges as if the commission is just something they have to put up with for a couple of hours every few months.
We don’t know if there will be an emergency meeting of the Animal Services Commission, but it would seem like a prime time for that commission to demonstrate to the Dallas City Council that the commission's advice needs to be heeded by city employees and respected.
When this modern shelter was built a few years ago, it was only after a decades-long political fight and nearly constant stall from city hall. The new shelter was overwhelmingly supported by citizens in a bond election – this was a second bond election because the first one was strangled by city hall for so long that the price of everything went up and the money from the original bond issue couldn’t finance diddly. This new shelter was opened with great fanfare. It was to be a place that would be a point of pride. The old shelters – particularly the one in Oak Cliff – were from a bygone era. People wouldn’t go to them to adopt animals because they were dark, dismal and smelled of death and disease and suffered from lousy maintenance.
Ah, but this new one opened gloriously and with ambition – the Dallas Animal Services Adoption Center, it is called. This name is starting to depart from reality as the facility takes on characteristics of a common city pound from the old days – a warehouse to store animals that are destined to die and this city can’t kill them quickly enough.
Most recently, maintenance corners have been cut by city hall. Where the shelter once had a dedicated maintenance crew, now it shares workers with other city facilities – and the drawback there is the maintenance workers aren’t trained in the needs of the shelter’s specially designed air-conditioning system.
Animals have been caged in the heated shelter this summer because, in large part, the a/c maintenance shortchanged the many units required for climate control and circulation – you don’t want airborne diseases being distributed through the system and turning the facility into a rancid ward filled with rasping, coughing and dying dogs and cats.
And now, in a shelter that has kill rate that rivals the body count of the stray dog rifle squads in Baghdad, someone or a group of someones decided it is OK to let a cat die in the stuffy confines of a shelter wall.
What is wrong with these people?
I don’t have a photo or description of this cat. I don’t have the cat’s name. I don’t have information about where the cat came from or how it came to be in the shelter – stray, owner surrender, left in the overnight drop box.
The cat died in a facility infamous for killing animals by the thousands each year with a needle and some chemicals. Humane death, they call it.
You can’t call being left in a wall without food, water or hope a humane death.
Did these taxpayer-financed employees stand outside the wall and call, “Kitty, kitty” and expect this cat to crawl out the way it came in?
We’ve seen a note written by an employee who was not involved, a shelter worker who is ashamed and who wants people to know that not all shelter workers are so cavalier with the life of “just a cat.”
Many people are upset by this incident. Elaine Munch, the president of the Metroplex Animal Coalition, in a statement issued via MAC, said, “I have for a long time had no faith in the City Manager's office to care about the City Animal Shelter, nor place management there who are qualified or care about the animals.
“Many of us know line workers who try very hard and I believe that we can still believe in those staff members. They have been intimidated and brow-beaten so much it is amazing they can still do their jobs and care about the animals, but they do still care.”
Elaine urges rescue groups to “keep your faith” in those workers and “pull as many animals as you can from the DAS shelter.”
She believes that the Grand Jury will “learn where the blame lies and that those people will be punished to the full extent of the law.”
And she urges people to write to the Dallas City Council members and “let them know that you are outraged and you want professional, animal welfare caretakers only at the DAS shelter and will not settle for anything less.
“What we do know now is that we must speak out for those animals that must endure at this facility. There must be change. We cannot rest until we turn City Hall upside-down or go down trying.
“Our elected officials are responsible to us - end of story.
“Sharpen your swords and get ready for a fight. I am angry. Join me in that emotion. We are the animals' only voice.”
Elaine is right on the mark when she urges the city to hire “professional animal welfare caretakers.”
The city shelter houses animals that are, for the most part, trusting and affectionate -- many are puzzled by why they no longer have their home and they may wonder at the end why they are feeling the sting of a needle and everything is going black. They should be treated with respect.
These animals are not “products” or “stackable inventory” – they are living beings with personalities and the ability to show affection and devotion.
It is time Dallas moved beyond indulging shelter workers and supervisors with the attitude of “hey, it’s a job.”
Train employees in “care” not just “work.” They have to be sharp. Make them the envy of other cities. Become exemplary. Put this shelter back on the path to respect – national respect, as was intended when it opened.
Demand that the employees work to build great pride in the Dallas Animal Services – if they don’t show an aptitude for respect, fire them. Do it quickly.
Shelter work is a mission. Even in Dallas.
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