It sounds like life for lost and homeless dogs in Livonia, LA used to be pretty wretched if they ended up at the city pound:
The dog pound is located outside, directly behind town hall and is tended to by a single paid employee. The Mayor of Livonia tells NBC33 his name is Brian and he looks after the dogs every afternoon.
Penned up outside, waiting all day long for a guy to come by to clean and throw some food down. And I don’t imagine Brian works 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year either. So there were probably even longer gaps in there which would be cruel to any dog, especially puppies who need to eat several times a day. It doesn’t sound like there was any veterinary care offered to the dogs and ultimately, they were killed – because you know, “unwanted” and such.
But last year, Lisa Shields moved to Livonia from Texas where she had been a shelter volunteer. She offered her services to the city. And how:
For nearly a year, Shields fed, bathed, and cared for the dogs like they were her own children. She would take them to adoption events, raised money for them, paid for their vet bills and never asked for anything in return.
Ms. Shields says she had an agreement with Brian that she would care for the dogs in the mornings, since he wasn’t there. She says things had been working out very well and killing had been completely eliminated since she came on board. Success by anyone’s standards. Or not:
At some point in the last month, Shields says Brian started having issues with the work she was doing with the dogs. The Mayor took issue too, saying Shields was over stepping her boundaries.
“I’m not saying she was breaking any rules but we have things that we have a guy, you know, that does washing of the pens, the feeding of the animals, you know, and we asked her, you know, don’t do those type of things” says Troy Chustz, the Mayor of Livonia.
The mayor banned Ms. Shields from the pound. And that’s with her not breaking any rules but simply volunteering to do some additional feeding and cleaning. I guess if she had broken any rules the mayor would have sent her to Gitmo.
“I can’t even drive by there and look now to see if there’s dogs down there because I know they’re just going to get the blue juice and be buried in the bayou and it’s just heartbreaking, it didn’t have to be this way, it didn’t have to go this far” continues Shields.
[…]
Shields is now hoping she can rally the town behind her at the next city council meeting.
Geez, I hope so too. Come on Livonia, give the lady who single-handledly eliminated the needless killing of the community’s lost and homeless pets while vastly improving their quality of life and paying their vet bills one more chance. Pretty please? If she promises to let some puppies go hungry and sit in filth?
(Thanks Davyd for the link.)
Wonder whose ego,you know, is being threatened. Something else going on I suspect. This is just impossible, you know, for me to get my mind wrapped around – the volunteer did all of this out of her own pocket, asking nothing in return, you know, and gets “fired” for cleaning cages and feeding puppies? REALLY?
Mr Mayor doesn’t sound very convincing or eloquent. Like, you know, somebody else is telling him what to say.
This is way beyond f%&*#d up!
“If she promises to let some puppies go hungry and sit in filth?”
I’m going with db on this one – there is something else at play in the equation. I think, you know, that one employee felt, you know, threatened. And maybe he knows someone who knows someone, you know? Or maybe it was just that he saw a person with lady parts doing, you know, his job better than, you know, he was and it made his man parts feel small and bad. So he went to his boss and said that the lady parts need to go.
Clearly, the actual solution here would be to fire Brian and hire Lisa. She’s clearly better at his job than he is (and I’ll bet she would be happy to have volunteers help her do it!).
If I lived there, I would be standing outside waiting to volunteer. And I’d bring 20 of my closest friends with me. Let’s see how many volunteers they turn away before there’s enough of a backlash for you know, someone high up to, you know, maybe get their head out of their…well, you know.
The Mayor is out of line! Why does he object to the help given to the animals! If the Mayor can’t see the good in this, he should be voted out of office! He has no idea of the good the animals need!
Interesting that Nathan Winograd has picked up this very story, too, on Facebook (I know, Shirley). Well said, mikken, you know.
I do hope the mayor gets all the publicity he deserves and makes plans for a career change.
I hope Lisa is able to rally local support even though she’s only lived there for about a year. She seems like a fantastic person, and she certainly succeeded in getting a lot of attention on the shelter — that might make a difference in the long run.
It’s typical get rid of the good and keep the bad! I wish people would work for the good of the animals, not someone who knows someone! Why do they have a problem with Lisa? She’s helping harmless animals in need of a loving hand and someone who cares about them! They need to let her back in!
Don’t waste any time. Just go to the press!
HERE’S ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF A MAYOR WHO DOESN’T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT THE DOG SAFETY! WHY DID THEY EVER GET THIS BASTARD IN THE MAYOR POSITION! I WONDER WHAT OTHER THINGS HE DOESN’T CARE ABOUT?