Queens Tribune, February 11-17, 1999

ANIMAL HOUSE
A Queens Farce

Queens' only city-run animal shelter is little more than a pit stop for animals on their way to the Manhattan shelter, where more often than not they are put to sleep. While $4 million was allocated to construct a better facility, the money has yet to be used.

GIMME SHELTER: Life Of A Queens Dog

By MELANIE CARROLL

[PHOTO] The Queens location of the Center for Animal Care and Control (CACC) cuurrently has only two animals up for adoption, the rest get shipped to the much larger Manhattan site, where most are put to sleep.

[PHOTO] Lotto was put to sleep by the CACC before his owners could locate the lost dog.

Adelina Osa sees stray dogs al most every day on her drive to work at a customs brokerage house in Jamaica. Late last year, Osa was leaving work early and noticed a dog Iying in a pool of blood on the street outside her office. The groaning animal had been hit by a truck.

Osa called the Queens Center for Animal Care and Control (CACC) around 3:40 p.m. The operator on the phone told her that a van was on its way to pick up the dog. But an hour went by, and no one showed up.

"So I called again," said Osa. "But they were closed." The answering machine said to report emergencies to the police, so she did. Half an hour later, the police arrived, put the dog in the trunk, and said they were taking the animal to Manhattan.

"Why Manhattan?" Osa asked. The cops replied that the Queens shelter closes at 4 p.m. and that all after-hours animals go to Manhattan. The Manhattan CACC reported the animal dead on arrival.

The Center for Animal Care and Control (CACC) is an organization contracted by the city's Department of Health to deal with animal problems throughout the city -- everything from rabid raccoons to wounded seagulls to house pets. Until 1995, this role was filled by the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA).

But while the CACC has facilities in all five boroughs, the Queens site is only a drop-off center. Located at the intersection of the Long Island Expressway and Queens Boulevard, the shelter is hardly visible from the road. Below street level a sign reads "Save a Life -- Adopt a NYC Shelter Animal." Inside, almost every cage is empty. In mid-January, one black cat and one white dog with matted hair are up for adoption.

"I fail to understand how the CACC can promote adoption when the vast majority of New Yorkers do not even know such facilities exist," commented Assemblyman Michael Cohen.

Animals found in Queens are more often than not are sent across the river to Manhattan, where they are more of ten than not put to sleep.

"To send a dog to the CACC is a death sentence," said Amy Goldman, an animal rescuer in Fresh Meadows. "Any dog would be better off having a gun put to its head, to put it out of its misery."

Maspeth resident Pat Hoppe agrees. On Friday, January 8, while taking her dog Lotto out for an afternoon walk, the dog broke away and bolted down the street. Hoppe searched the Maspeth neighbor hood and found no trace of Lotto. Hoppe later called the Queens CACC to see if her dog had been picked up. Since Lotto still had her collar, identification tag, and leash on, Hoppe assumed it would be easy to find her dog.

The man at the Queens CACC shelter told Hoppe that Lotto was not at the Queens shelter -- if she had been picked up at all she would be at the Manhattan or Brooklyn shelter. "He told me no animals stay in Queens. So we spent Saturday morning putting up signs and then headed to the Manhattan shelter," said Hoppe. The dog owner went through the entire shelter including the euthanasia ward -- where animals are put to sleep. "We were too late -- she had already been put down." Lotto was killed in Manhattan on Saturday, January 9th at 1 p.m. -- just 24 hours after she had escaped her owners.

The CACC maintains that Lotto arrived at the shelter without a collar or identification -- and that she was suffering as a result of being hit by a car. The agency said Hoppe was unable to indentify her dog at the Manhattan shelter.

Gary Kaskel, animal activist and co-chair of the Shelter Reform Action Committee, says dogs being shipped from borough to borough continually get lost in the CACC system. "There are constant mix-ups and inconsistent record keeping. This is a common problem and animals often fall through the cracks."

OPEN ADMISSIONS

Unfortunately, say animal activists, there are few viable alternatives. The private shelters are all filled up," said Goldman. "They tell you there is an eight month waiting period and that you should find a home on your own." Goldman added that Blackie, the dog she found this winter, is being flown to a rescue group in Vermont. "There is nothing available in Queens," she said. Private animal shelters, such as Flushing's Animal Haven or the well known North Shore Animal League in Long Island, have the privilege of rejecting unwanted animals. This is how private shelters maintain their no kill policies; once the shelter fills up they stop accept ing animals. This is a luxury the CAGC does not have. The agency is responsible for any animal that comes its way.

Queens animal activists believe the CACC provides the borough with inad equate service. Marlene Blanco, who runs a small no-kill shelter in Bayside, said "The CACC doesn't spend much of their money on the animals. The Queens location is bad and so are the hours.

In 1998, the Humane Society of the United States was commissioned by the CACC to evaluate its operations. The report found the Queens shelter to be one of the worst. The Humane Society wrote: "The Bronx and Queens facilities, both store-front adoption sites, present an other complex set of problems... For example, the Queens facility is tucked away on a service road, below street level."

'GIMME SHELTER'

The solution, according to a spokesperson for the CACC is the creation of a larger shelter in Queens.

Borough President Claire Shulman says that she has been asking for a full service animal shelter for nearly a decade. "We showed them sites last year," said Shulman spokesman Dan Andrews. "Since then we haven't heard anything. There is no evidence that anything is happening."

"There has been talk of a new shelter for some time," said Councilman John Sabini. They were considering a possible site in Elmhurst, then one in Rego Park but I haven't heard anything in quite some time."

"We need a proper animal shelter," said State Senator Serphin Maltese. Queens county is such a large county and an animal shelter is an essential ser vice for the borough."

In fact, the city slated $4 million for the purpose of building a Queens shelter in the 1999 budget, but this money has not been put to use.

The CACC maintains that a 30,000 square feet Queens shelter is in the works. "But we don't have any plans," said CACC spokesman Kyle Burkhart. There are no designs or architectural drawings. Right now the Manhattan site is more of a priority."

However, if the money remains unused afterJune, the $4 million could become part of the city's budget surplus, and be reallocated to another project, or rolled over into the fiscal year 2000 budget.

According to a spokesperson for the City Council, $2.3 million is slated to be rolled over to next year's budget, mean ing that the shelter has lost $1.7 million as a resulrof inaction.

At the same time, the Manhattan shelter's $4 million renovation begins this summer. In the Brooklyn shelter, the shelters $3.5 million face-lift is in its last of three phases.

Some City Council Members say they do not approve of putting more money into the CACC.

The problem is that no one is in con trol at the CACC," added City Council member Kathryn Freed. "It's really like throwing money away. They don't do any thing well except kill animals. It's horren dous."

Neither the Mayor's office, the Borough President's Office, the City Council, the Dept. of Health or the CACC were willing to comment as to why the money had not been used or whether or not a Queens shelter would ever be built.