Category: Activists & Organizations

Children & Animals

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

Barbara Carr of Buffalo, New York, executive director of the
SPCA Serving Erie County, attended the non-governmental forum at the
recent United Nations World Conference on Women, held in China. “I put
forth that the marriage of humane education to literacy is as old as history,”
she said, “and that we have taught children and societies values and morals
through stories about animals from Aesop to Walt Disney. I outlined the link
between violent treatment of animals and violent treatment of women and
children. The other delegates easily saw the point.”
A recent Illinois Department of Conservation telephone survey
of 504 state residents found that only 22% approved of fur trapping and
27% approved of fur hunting––and 50% hadn’t heard of the agency. After
hearing a series of statements favoring fur trapping and hunting, however,
which seem to have exaggerated wildlife nuisances, 46% approved of fur
trapping; outright disapproval of fur trapping dropped from 71% to 46%.

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Animal rescue abroad

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

A wide-ranging new anti-cruelty bill
introduced in Victoria state, Australia, on
September 7 by agriculture minister Bill McGrath
would give greater powers of intervention to prevent
cruelty to police, Royal SPCA, and state government
inspectors; extend the definition of animals to cover
fish and crustaceans; apply to the use of animals in
reasearch; remove religous-based exemptions to
existing laws governing the humane slaughter of fowl;
and ban the transport of untethered dogs in the backs
of trucks and trailers unless they are helping to move
livestock. The provisions pertaining to aquatic life,
McGrath said, are “not intended to intrude on existing
commercial practices in the fishing industries, but
will enable inspectors to investigate the transport and
display of crayfish and the preparation of fish and
crustaceans for the table.”

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A WHALE OF A TALE FROM INSIDE HSUS

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

WASHINGTON D.C.––Fired on
August 11, according to one Humane Society
of the U.S. senior executive and numerous
staff, HSUS vice president for investigations
and legislation David Wills remains officially
“on administrative leave,” amid an apparent
board-level power struggle.
ANIMAL PEOPLE sources within
HSUS indicate that HSUS president Paul
Irwin and some board members want Wills
out; John Hoyt, president of Humane Society
International and Wills’ longtime patron, purportedly
wants to keep him. HSI is the
umbrella for HSUS and numerous affiliates.
HSUS/HSI board chair O.J. “Joe”
Ramsey is said to be heading a probe of accusations
that Wills misused funds and sexually
harassed subordinates. A corporate attorney
in Sacramento, California, Ramsey has
served on the HSUS board since 1975; his
arrival roughly coincided with that of Irwin.
Ten days after the September edition
of ANIMAL PEOPLE detailed complaints
against Wills by many current and former
HSUS staffers, we received a letter from
Washington D.C. media lawyer Stuart
Pierson, charging we had made “defamatory
and false statements about Mr. Wills” by
“asserting that Mr. Wills was fired.”

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HSUS anti-hunting except…

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

Animal Rights America board member Stuart
Chaifetz charged via the Internet on July 15 and August 20
that the Humane Society of the U.S. had retreated from
anti-hunting policy by endorsing deer culls at three New
Jersey state parks––Black River State Park in 1992; the
Watchung Reservation in 1993, where sharpshooters rather
than sport hunters did the killing; and Lewis Morris State
Park this year. Chaifetz said HSUS regional representative
Nina Austenberg had asked him to cancel a hunt sabotage at
Black River, and had ratified the Watchung and Lewis
Morris culling plans.

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Is it time for Helen Jones of ISAR to retire?

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

CLARKS SUMMIT, Pennsylvania–– Dave
Sickles says he moved to northern Pennsylvania, at his own
expense, on the promise of an “executive level position”
starting August 1 with the International Society for Animal
Rights. But when he reported for duty, Sickles says, ISAR
founder and president Helen Jones told him he wouldn’t be
hired, because there was purportedly nothing for him to do.
Yet, Sickles continues, there was plenty for him to
do in the weeks preceding his purported hiring date, when he
fulfilled ISAR assignments as a volunteer. Once in late June,
Sickles avers, he bought a case of white wine on Jones’
instructions at a local liquor store, using an ISAR charge
card. On several occasions, Sickles asserts, he witnessed
Jones having “five glasses of wine for lunch.” As a volunteer,
he says, he shared office space with “sixty or seventy
cats, many of whom were sick and dying.” And Sickles
claims he saw other signs of bizarre behavior by Jones,
including bouts of fear of venturing outside, called agoraphobia,
that were so severe she could scarcely cross the street.

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MORE MONKEY BUSINESS

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

ACE Hardware monkeys
A spider monkey, a crab-eating macaque,
and three capuchins who for many years were kept in
solitary confinement as mascots of the five Buikema’s
Ace Hardware stores in Chicago’s western suburbs
were delivered to Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation
on September 2 as result of a year-long campaign led
by Deb Leahy and Joe Taksel of Illinois Animal
Action, with final negotiations handled by Bill
Dollinger of Friends of Animals. The effort gained
momentum after one monkey developed an ear infection
and eventually tore part of the ear off, leading to
USDA citations of the franchise owner for failing to
provide adequate veterinary care. A mix-up between
IAA and FoA resulted in IAA arranging to send the
monkeys to WRR while FoA, unaware of that deal,
asked Wally Swett of Primarily Primates to take them.

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Seven chimps safe, maybe more

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

STIRLING FOREST, N.Y.––Up in the air for
more than a year, the fate of seven chimpanzees formerly
used in biomedical research by the U.S. Army was apparently
settled on the eve of a September 15 deadline when former
New York University primatologist James Mahoney reportedly
flew to California and personally approved Wildlife
Waystation as their retirement destination.
The chimps were mustered out of the Army into the
custody of the NYU-affiliated Laboratory for Experimental
Medicine and Surgery In Primates, which subcontracted with
the Buckshire Corporation, of Perkasie, Pennsylvania, for
their temporary care while permanent facilities were built in
Texas. Both LEMPSIP founder Jan Moor-Jankowski and
Mahoney were close to retirement, and anticipated retiring
their entire 225-member chimp colony, if possible.
It never happened. In August 1994, MoorJankowski
and Mahoney resigned from the NYU Institutional
Animal Care and Use Committee in protest over what MoorJankowski
called “highly reprehensible” conduct that “must
be stopped” on the part of fellow NYU primate researcher
Robert Wood, who since 1986 had conducted controversial
drug addiction experiments on chimps and squirrel monkeys
at a separate facility.

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Editorial: The sounds of silence

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

At least a third of the ANIMAL PEOPLE readership is actively involved in animal
protection law enforcement, as animal control officers, conservation officers, humane
society legal counsels, cruelty investigators, and so forth––and we’d bet at least a third of
them are at this very moment frustrated by an animal abuse or neglect case, or a poaching
case, or some other investigation that could result in a successful prosecution or civil suit if
known witnesses would just step forward.
Journalists work to a similar standard. We’re not actually prosecuting cases or filing
lawsuits seeking enforcement of the Animal Welfare Act or Endangered Species Act,
but we do have to consider courtroom rules of evidence in connection with everything we
print. Contrary to the common misassumptions of nonsubscribing callers, who often expect
us to publish their side of an issue and no other, based on hearsay, and keep their own
names out of it, we don’t publish unverified allegation; we always try to get every side of
controversial stories; we work hard to be fair, as a matter of personal and occupational
pride; and we must at all times be cognisant of the consequences of libel, not just as a matter
of law but out of our own sense of responsibility.

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NO MONKEY-HUNTING

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 1995:

DILLEY, Texas––On condition of
anonymity, a prominent Texas attorney has
agreed to guarantee the payment of $75,000
due in October to secure the new home of the
South Texas Primate Observatory, a 183-acre
tract near the town of Millet. The Texas
Parks and Wildlife Department meanwhile
denies reports that it authorized hunters to
shoot any snow monkeys who might escape
from the old site at Dilley.
STPO houses a unique free-roaming
troop of snow monkeys whose families have
been studied since 1954. The colony began at
the long-defunct Arashiyama Sanctuary in the
monkeys’ native habitat outside Kyoto,
Japan. But young male snow monkeys tend
to escape from virtually any enclosure to seek
females each spring, and by 1972, residents
of Kyoto were fed up. Slated to be killed,
about 150 of the monkeys were instead airlifted
through an international rescue effort to
their present 58-acre enclosure within the
sprawling Burns Ranch, 60 miles south of
San Antonio.

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