Judge tells the USDA to sit out California Proposition Two fight– Feds barred from using promo funds on ads backing agribusiness

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:

 

SAN FRANCISCO–U.S. District Judge
Marilyn Hall Patel on September 22, 2008 ordered
the USDA to stay out of the agribusiness effort
to defeat the California Prevention of Farm
Animal Cruelty Act, Proposition Two on the state
ballot. Judge Patel ruled that the USDA may not
legally spend funds collected from egg producers
by the American Egg Board to promote the egg
industry on television ads that may affect the
election outcome.
The American Egg Board is a an 18-member
panel appointed by the U.S. Secretary of
Agriculture. The two ads at issue suggest buying
locally raised eggs. They feature the same
spokesperson who appears in ads directly funded
by the egg industry which assert that Proposition
Two will drive egg producers out of California.
“A government lawyer described the ads as
‘neutral and educational’ and said they were
unrelated to Proposition Two,” wrote San
Francisco Chronicle staff writer Bob Egelko.

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Appalled by Palin, Humane Society Legislative Fund endorses Obama

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 200*:

WASHINGTON D.C.-The Republican nomination
of Alaska governor Sarah Palin to run for U.S.
vice president alongside presidential candidate
John McCain inspired the Humane Society
Legislative Fund to break with precedent in
unanimously endorsing Democratic presidential
nominee Barack Obama and his running mate, Joe
Biden.
The Humane Society Legislative Fund board
includes prominent Republicans as well as
Democrats.
“While we have endorsed hundreds of
Congressional candidates for election, both
Democrats and Republicans, we have never before
endorsed a presidential candidate,” wrote Humane
Society Legislative Fund president Mike Markarian
in his September 22, 2008 blog.

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Closer regulation of exotic cat facilities may follow two tiger attacks in Missouri

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:

ST. LOUIS–Kenneth and Sandra Smith, owners of the now
closed Wesa-A-Geh-Ya exotic animal park in Warren County, Missouri,
and Wesa-A-Geh-Ya board member Roy Elder were on September 19, 2008
charged with evidence tampering for allegedly trying to mislead the
county sheriff’s department into believing that a pit bull terrier
rather than a tiger attacked volunteer Jacob Barr.
“Barr, 26, had part of his leg surgically amputated
following the August 3 mauling,” recounted Associated Press writer
Betsy Taylor. “Elder and Sandra Smith are accused of lying to
investigators. Kenneth Smith, who shot and killed the attacking
animal, is accused of moving the dead tiger’s body to a different
location.”

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Editorial feature: Animal welfare & conservation in conflict

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:

 

While in Indonesia for the August 2008
Asia for Animals conference, the fifth in a
series co-sponsored by ANIMAL PEOPLE since 2001,
ANIMAL PEOPLE president Kim Bartlett joined
several other conference attendees in a visit to
the International Animal Rescue facilities in
West Java, near Bogor, two hours by car south
of Jakarta.
The visit provided an unexpectedly stark
illustration of some of the sharpest edges and
conflicts in the three-cornered relationship
among animal welfare, wildlife species
conservation, and habitat protection.

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Shelters discontinue killing animals for other agencies, gassing, & drop-off cages

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:

 

TULSA, CLOVIS, MACON, LAKE CITY, HAYWARD–Beginning a
“new era” in animal care and control, according to Tulsa, Okalahoma
mayor Kathy Taylor, the Tulsa animal shelter on September 8, 2008
quit killing animals for surrounding communities’ animal control
agencies.
“For at least three decades, the city has charged suburbs
$1.00 per animal destroyed at Tulsa’s shelter. Last year, an
estimated 4,000 animals from outside the city were killed in the
shelter’s gas chamber,” recalled Tulsa World staff writer P.J.
Lassek.

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Hurricanes Gustav & Ike test federal pet evacuation mandate

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:

HOUSTON, NEW ORLEANS– Hurricanes Gustav and Ike, hitting
the Gulf Coast barely more than a week apart in September 2008,
brought the first major test of the Pets Evacuation and
Transportation Standards Act, passed by Congress in 2006.
The PETS Act was passed after evidence surfaced that many of
the human fatalities attributed to Hurricane Katrina in 2005 resulted
from people refusing to evacuate because they could not take pets
with them. The purpose of the PETS Act is to ensure that provisions
for pet evacuation are incorporated into regional disaster planning.
“Three years after pet owners were reduced to tears while
being forced to leave their dogs and cats in neighborhoods affected
by Hurricane Katrina, emergency response officials are taking
extraordinary care to ensure animal safety,” wrote Alex Branch of
the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

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Letters [Sep 2008]

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:
 
Turtles

I had my tickets ready to fly to Bali for the 2008 Asia for
Animals conference, but was forced to stay back, as I had to take
care of around twelve types of endangered tortoises in a pond
constructed some 700 years back by a king for his people inside the
premises of the Hargrib Mahdab Temple, around 40 kilometers from my
home.
The Kamrup deputy commissioner, with funding from the prime
minister, in April 2008 constructed a five-foot-high concrete wall
around the pond, preventing the tortoises from coming to the shore
of the pond to bask in the sun and laying their eggs. They developed
fungal infections from staying inside the pond continuously, with
water leeches feeding on them. Fifteen tortoises died recently
within one months time. Three hundred fifty coconut trees around the
pond were felled in the name of beautification, so there was no
shade for the tortoises, and the pump for a fountain installed
within the pond made the water even hotter.
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Off-exhibit secrets of troubled zoos

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:
UBUD, GIANYAR–The Bali Zoo, featuring
exhibits from which animals often “go walkabout,”
might be described as emphasizing form over
substance.
Occupying a six-acre forested ravine in a
residential neighborhood in Singapadu, a suburb
of Ubud, the Bali Zoo has been described by
tourism media as a “hidden jewel”–and it is, at
a glance.
A closer look reveals
species-inappropriate exhibits, neglect of
animal health, and potentially deadly accidents
to visitors and neighbors lurking just around
many of the bends of the zoo’s winding paths.

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What does leadership transition mean for WSPA?

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 2008:
LONDON, MONTREAL–Whatever future
direction the World Society for the Protection of
Animals takes, it will not be for much longer
under Peter Davies, the WSPA director general
since September 2002.
ANIMAL PEOPLE on July 17, 2008 obtained
a copy of a WSPA document entitled “Chief
Executive Search,” which WSPA board members have
apparently distributed to prospective applicants.
Stating that “The current Director General is due
to retire from office in June 2009,” the
document outlines the qualifications that the
WSPA board hopes to find in potential successors.
Among 15 enumerated attributes of “an
ideal chief executive,” according to the “Chief
Executive Search” criteria, only two even
mention animal advocacy.
Point #9 is that the “ideal chief
executive” will “have a developed belief in
animal advocacy and citizen involvement in the
public arena as a force for change.”

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