Many more helped during the Hurricane Katrina/Rita disaster

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

These organizations, listed in semi-alphabetical order,
also served with distinction. (Some are listed out of alpha where
several collaborated on a single project.)

“Feral and stray cats have not yet been addressed on a large
scale in this rescue effort,” Alley Cat Allies declared on September
16, initiating efforts “to help rebuild the caregiver network,
remove feral cats from shelters, collect and provide food and water
to known colonies, identify other colonies in need of help, and
assess future needs such as spay/neuter services and ongoing support
for caregivers.” The Alley Cat Allies team worked out of Bogalusa,
Louisiana.

The American Humane Association sent Dick Green to
Lamar-Dixon. Like Lamar-Dixon coordinator Dave Pauli, Green was a
veteran of the Indian Ocean tsunami recovery effort in Sri Lanka.

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Reunions & adoptions

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

Reunions with lost pets occurred as far away as the Marin
County Humane Society, north of San Francisco, where pediatrician
Brenda Singh on September 16 found her nine-year-old Welsh springer
spaniel Lady, two weeks after the dog bolted from a friend at a
Baton Rouge evacuation center.
In all, San Francisco Bay area shelters fostered at least 14
planeloads of animals, mostly flown from Louisiana and Mississippi
by Operation Orphans of the Storm, coordinated by real estate
developer Bill McLaughlin.
Other participants included Countryside Rescue, the
Berkeley/East Bay Humane Society, the East Bay SPCA, the Peninsula
Humane Society, Pets Lifeline, the SPCA of Monterey County, the
Sacramento SPCA, the San Francisco SPCA, the San Jose Animal Care
Center, the Humane Society of Sonoma County, and personnel from the
San Francisco Department of Animal Care & Control.

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How exotics fared

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

New Orleans Audubon Park Zoo president Ron Forman on October
3 told the World Association of Zoos & Aquariums annual conference in
New York that restoring the Audubon facilities would probably cost
$60 million.
“A skeleton staff of 12 struggled to feed and get water to
1,400 hungry and thirsty animals with limited emergency provisions,”
Oscar Corral of the Miami Herald reported on September 5. The crew
worked around “fallen palms, eucalyptus and willow trees blocking
the paths,” but “the animals mostly survived and are secure,”
Corral assured.
“One of the huge alligators is missing,” Corral noted, “and
some birds died,” along with two otters and a raccoon.
The Audubon Aquarium of the Americas fared far worse, Corral
added. About a third of the 6,000 resident fish and other marine
animals died within a week of Katrina, due to loss of electricity to
run the water and air circulation systems. Most of the rest died
during the next week, Associated Press writer Daisy Nguyen reported.
Nineteen penguins and two sea otters were rescued and flown
to the Monterey Bay Aquarium on September 9.

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Editorial: Fighting sinking feelings of failure in an inundated city

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

Of the many stresses that Hurricane Katrina and Rita rescuers
had to deal with, perhaps the most ubiquitous was the feeling among
exhausted volunteers that no matter what they did, they had not done
enough.
“I have personally pulled hundreds of animals from roof tops,
attics, and houses,” HSUS food and water team leader Jane Garrison
e-mailed to Karen Dawn of DawnWatch on September 19. “It is amazing
to me that these animals are still alive. I got a dog off a roof who
should have weighed 90 pounds, but was down to 40 pounds from being
stuck with no food and water. These animals want to live and are
showing us this every day.”
But Garrison hardly felt uplifted.

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Editorial: Donations & disaster

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

Disasters requiring monumental animal relief efforts are
likely to happen increasingly often in coming years, as climatic
instability increases due to global warming. Thus the lessons
learned from the response to the evacuation of New Orleans, many of
them still just beginning to be absorbed, may appear to be as
important 13 years from now as the lessons from Hurricane Andrew in
1992 were to enabling the humane community to respond to Katrina and
Rita with markedly more efficacy than the governmental and nonprofit
human services sectors.
The animals’ need has been great after the devastating storm,
and there is rebuilding to follow in Louisiana and Mississippi. On
the positive side, there is now the possibility of improving
conditions for animals in the Deep South in many ways, through the
infusion of new interest, new energy, and new capital. Many of the
disaster relief workers who ventured south to help had never seen the
“Third World of the U.S.” before. Many vowed to return, to help
follow through with the rebuilding, and all who served or donated
are likely to have an enduring intensified interest in animal welfare
in parts of rural Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama that only six
weeks ago were seldom noticed.

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BUCHAREST ANIMAL SHELTERS FLOODED

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

BUCHAREST–Four times the average rainfall for the entire
month of September hit Bucharest, Romania, in only 72 hours on
September 20-22, flooding animal shelters including the Asociatia
Natura and Fundatia Daisy Hope, featured in the June 2004 edition of
ANIMAL PEOPLE.
Also flooded was the Fundatia Speranta, one of only four
shelters, three of them in Romania, that ever received a zero on
the 100-point ANIMAL PEOPLE scoring scale [“How ANIMAL PEOPLE
evaluates shelters,” June 2004.] “I have four areas under a half meter of water,” Daisy Hope founder
Aura Maratas e-mailed on September 20. “I lifted the cages up on
pallets. I have no place to move them, and have nowhere to drain
the water. We could not find a pump. They are all gone from the
shops, and everyone needs a pump.”
Daisy Hope did not lose any dogs to high water during the
three-day ordeal, but a worker quit after suffering a severe bite
from a frightened dog.

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Carriage horse rescues in the old city

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

A week after the New Orleans levies broke, the Lamar-Dixon
Expo Center and 4-H Center in Gonzales, 45 miles north, held more
then 220 horses and mules, many of them evacuated from carriage
stables.
Equine and Bovine Magazine managing editor Rebecca Gimenez
reported rescuing 63 horses from three feet of water that filled two
barns in Kenner, near the New Orleans airport, but the most
dramatic equine rescue was of 22 horses and mules kept by Mid-City
Carriages. Stranded for a week after the city flooded, the animals
were attended by stable hands Darnell Stewart, Fabien Redmund, and
Lucien Mitchell Jr., who volunteered to stay with them. The three
men led the horses and mules to high ground at Leimann Park, slept
in shifts to fend off would-be horse thieves, and at last assisted
in evacuating them all on September 7.
One horse died earlier at the Mid-City Carriages stable, and
two others died later while receiving emergency care at Louisiana
State University.

New Orleans pet evacuation crisis brings hope of rescue mandate

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

WASHINGTON D.C., NEW ORLEANS–U.S. Representatives
Chris-topher Shays (R-Connecticut) and Tom Lantos (D-California),
co-chairing the Congressional Friends of Animals caucus, on
September 22, 2005 introduced legislation that would require the
Federal Emergency Management Agency to withhold grant funding from
communities that fail to develop pet evacuation and transport
standards.
U.S. Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-Connecticut) indicated that
there will also be Senate attention to animal rescue in disasters.
“It is heartbreaking to hear of families forced to leave pets
behind as they followed instructions to evacuate or were being
rescued,” Lieberman said. “As the ranking member of the Committee on
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, I have joined the chair,
Senator Susan Collins (R-ME), in calling for an investigation of
this immense failure in the government’s response to the Hurricane
Katrina tragedy.”
Senator John Ensign (R-Nevada) said he had lobbied the White
House to “name someone to take charge of dealing with animals left
behind by people fleeing the storms, as well as countless strays,”
wrote Benjamin Grove of the Las Vegas Sun.

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How individual disaster relief workers can claim a deduction

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, October 2005:

GUILFORD, Ct.–After consulting with the Internal Revenue
Service about how individual rescuers could make their Hurricane
Katrina/Rita rescue expenses tax-deductible, Connecticut Council for
Humane Education/National Institute for Animal Advocacy founder Julie
Lewin distributed to rescuers a three-point plan:
1) Talk to me about volunteering on behalf of CCHE/NIFAA. We
must speak in advance of your trip.
2) Donate to CCHE the amount you expect the trip to cost you
and get a tax deduction for it, thus significantly lowering the net
cost to you.
3) Mail all legitimate receipts to CCHE, which will
reimburse you up to the amount you donated.

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