BOOKS: The Voice of the Infinite in the Small

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

The Voice of the Infinite
in the Small:
Revisioning the Insect-Human
Connection
by Joanne Elizabeth Lauck
Swan, Raven & Co. (POB 190, Mill Spring, NC
28756), 1999. 361 pages, paperback. $18.95.

Bugs are in vogue. The Disney Studios hit children’s
film A Bug’s Life and the high-tech “Bug Show” entertaining
thousands of visitors a day at the Tree of Life in Walt Disney’s
Wild Animal Kingdom attest to that. Bugs including a tarantula
with remarkably mammal-like fur and trilobite-like Madagascar
cockroach larvae were also among the stars at the sleep-overs
hosted throughout the summer at the Woodland Park Zoo in
Seattle, where staff made a particular point of debunking cockroach
phobia. Many other major zoos added bug exhibits.

Kenya Wildlife chief Leakey given whole civil service

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

NAIROBI––Stating, “The time has come to give
public jobs to those who can deliver,” Kenyan president
Daniel arap Moi on July 20 promoted Kenya Wildlife Service
director Richard Leakey to the post of permanent secretary in
the office of the president, making him head of the entire
Kenya civil service and secretary to the cabinet.
“Leakey, 54, a third generation Kenyan who was in
his second stint as director of the KWS, has a reputation for
efficiency and thoroughness,” explained Emman Omari of
The Nation, the leading Kenyan newspaper. Leakey previously
headed KWS from 1988 until mid-1994, a year after losing
both legs in a plane crash but gaining public stature with his
swift return to duty.
Resigning in frustration with arap Moi minions who
hoped to open Kenya to commercial hunting, Leakey formed
Safina, a leading opposition party, and was elected to the
Kenyan parliament. After arap Moi personally denounced
Leakey, a pro-arap Moi mob dragged him from his car and
flogged him––but when KWS became “a staff-bloated organization
wallowing in cash flow problems,” as Nation reporter
Ken Opala put it, arap Moi put Leakey back in charge.

LAST OF THE TULI 30, LOKI/MURTHY, AND THAI LOGGING ELEPHANTS ALL FIND REFUGE

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

JOHANNESBURG, CHENNAI, BANGKOK– –
Seven thousand South Africans marched on African Game
Services owner Riccardo Ghiazza’s farm near Brits on July 11
demanding an end to wild elephant exports and freedom for the
nine elephants of the “Tuli 30” then still with Ghiazza.
Ten burly bikers crashed Ghiazza’s gate and threatened
to free the elephants themselves, said WildNet Africa.
Outrage built for a week after the South African
Broadcast Corporation program Carte Blanche on July 4 aired
National SPCA undercover video of mahouts beating the elephants.
The videotaping was done at the Ghiazza farm over a
two-month interval by NSPCA inspectors Andries Venter, 25,
Yvonne Seaton, 26, and Karen Moller, 24, following instructions
from a High Court judge.

ANIMAL CARE AND CONTROL, RESCUE, AND ALTERNATIVES TO KILLING

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

Management
Indianapolis police lieutenant
John H. Walton on August 2 took over as
director of the city Animal Control Division.
Lieutenant Spencer Moore, director since
1993, was reassigned at his own request to
Youth Services. Public safety director Alan
Handt, M.D., said the shifts were “unrelated
to recent complaints” about shelter operations
aired in June by the Indianapolis Star News.
Walton, wrote Star News reporter Bonnie
Harris, “comes to his new position with no
animal control experience. Walton ran into
difficulties in 1995, when he was charged
with raping a female acquaintance. A jury
acquitted him in April 1996; however, the
Indianapolis Civilian Police Merit Board
found Walton had violated departmental rules
in connection with the incident. As a result,
he was suspended for two months and demoted
to sergeant,” winning promotion back to lieutenant
just before his reassignment.

CVMA to fix 60,000 feral cats

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

ALAMEDA, California––Maddie’s Fund, the $200 million
foundation formed by PeopleSoft founders Dave and Cheryl Duffield to
promote no-kill animal control, on August 2 announced a grant of $3.2 million
to the California Veterinary Medical Association, “to spay or neuter
60,000 additional feral cats in California” above and beyond the number
altered in 1998.
“The first phase of the project begins today,” a joint release
issued by Maddie’s Fund and the CVMA stated. “The CVMA anticipates it
will complete all three phases by June 2002.”
Participating veterinarians are to receive $50 per surgery.
Administrative costs are estimated at $70,000 per year.
Feral cats are defined as those who “generally do not voluntarily
accept handling by humans, and are ‘feral, independent wildlife’ or ‘feral,
interdependent free-roaming/unowned,’” as described by longtime Cat
Fanciers Association board member Joan Miller in a 1993 article for the
Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association.

THEY CAN’T SAVE LIVES ON SUNSHINE

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

FLORIDA––Monroe County on July 8 turned
over management of the Key West and Marathon animal
shelters to the Florida Keys SPCA––and cut the county
animal control budget by 10%.
Despite the cut, Florida Keys SPCA president
Gwen Hawtof was reportedly optimistic that animal care
would improve and shelter killing decrease. The
Humane Animal Care Coalition has already made similar
progress after taking over the Key Largo shelter in
1998, HACC president Tom Garretson told M i a m i
Herald staff writer Hancy Klingener.
But even before the reported “worst parvovirus
outbreak in memory” hit Orange County Animal
Services in Orlando, it was a hard month for many
other Florida humane institutions.

HSUS wrings hands over regulatory failure

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

WASHINGTON D.C.––“In an
unfortunate decision for animals whose care
falls under the auspices of the USDA, the
Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service
has removed the requirement [in proposed
new Animal Welfare Act enforcement regula –
tions] that solid resting surfaces be provided
for all animals kept in commercial breeding
facilities,” lamented assistant editor Scott
Kirkwood in the July/August 1999 edition of
Animal Sheltering.
Animal Sheltering is a publication
of the Humane Society of the U.S. ––and
Kirkwood either didn’t know or just didn’t
mention the background to the failed proposed
requirement, detailed in the September
1995 edition of ANIMAL PEOPLE.

SEX, MONEY AND POWER IN HUMANE WORK: WOMEN EXECS ARE FEWER, PAID LESS

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

BOSTON, PHILADELPHIA,
CULLOWHEE, N.C.––Ten years after
accusing the Massachusetts SPCA of genderbased
discrimination, Marjorie C. McMillan,
DVM, in July 1999 collected a $428,000 settlement:
$150,000 in back pay, plus interest.
Hired by the MSPCA as an animal
care technician while still a university undergraduate,
McMillan earned her veterinary
degree in 1974 and by 1989 was head of radiology
at Angell Memorial Hospital, the flagship
of the MSPCA chain of three animal hospitals
and eight regional shelters.

Pennsylvania Supreme Court rules against “cruel and moronic” Hegins pigeon shoot

September 1, 1999 Archivist Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1999:

Bob Tobash, chief organizer of the Fred Coleman
Memorial Pigeon Shoot held each Labor Day since 1935 in
Hegins, Pennsylvania, on August 1 told James E. Wilkerson
of Harrisburg Morning Call that the 1999 shoot will go on as
scheduled––but if it does, the Pennsyvlania Supreme Court
unanimously ruled on July 22, Pennsylvania SPCA anti-cruelty
officers can stop it and arrest the participants.
The court did not rule on the legality of the shoot
itself, but affirmed the authority of the PSPCA to act against
cruelty anywhere in Pennsylvania, as authorized by the state
legislature in 1868. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court thus
overturned Schuykill County Common Pleas Court and state
Superior Court verdicts which held that PSPCA officer
Clayton Hulsizer was outside his jurisdiction when he sought
an injunction to stop the 1997 shoot.

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