Letters to the Editor: The cat shelter furor
by Tucson Citizen on Jul. 10, 2008, under OpinionEditor’s note: The Citizen has received many letters regarding the furor at the Hermitage Cat Shelter. The shelter has replaced its staff, switched to new veterinary services, euthanized about 40 cats and filed a complaint with police against the shelter’s former cat care manager. About 50 people unhappy with the changes have formed the Coalition to Save the Hermitage Cat Shelter.
Dismissals made over the phone
I am indirectly involved with the Hermitage. My daughter worked there and was one of the people fired because she asked questions.
The week before, she was told she was doing a great job. And then when Executive Director Mary Jo Spring found out that she signed her name to a letter to the board, she was told that she was going to be fired. And to make matters worse, she was fired over the phone just after her boyfriend who worked there also was fired over the phone. How unprofessional.
Of course, she was one of those terrible uncaring caregivers who was in it for the money. She was paid $6.75 per hour. She was willing to work for minimum wage because she got to care for the cats – all of them. Within a month she knew most of their names and personalities.
She is a dedicated worker who is now working for Casa de los Gatos for more money, more responsibility and better surroundings.
I resent Spring’s accusations toward my daughter and her friends.
(My daughter) called us in tears the day she was fired. Not because she was fired; she was very concerned with the welfare of several of the cats she had taken a shine to. She wanted to adopt one of the special needs cats. She has found out that this cat has been sent to the vet and so far she has not heard if he came back.
PETER MORRIS
Documentation should reveal truth on shelter
Re the July 4 article, “Cat shelter undergoes major changes”:
I appreciate the time you have spent on this, but I would ask you to please investigate more. You are taking M.J. Spring’s word for things that are absolutely not true. And being a nonprofit they have to provide documentation to any person who asks. Some of those documents would be Form 990, Form 1023, current by-laws etc.
If everything is on the up and up, why will they not provide them?? Especially since not doing so endangers its nonprofit status. Then ask how many newsletters have been sent out to donors and sponsors explaining changes.
Why have repeated requests to address the board been denied or ignored? They can tell you that they were not made properly, but even when they were, they were ignored. Something is going on here and further investigation is needed.
Forty cats were euthanized in one month? What kind of documentation did you see to verify that these were sick cats?? All I am asking is that you verify what you are being told with hard proof.
I would think that the fact that there is no one employed at the Hermitage at this time, nor in the last month, who can positively identify each and every cat would be alarming in itself. How can they possibly treat cats when they do not know their identity? I can guarantee you that there were cats euthanized that were not ill.
Please investigate more. I am sure you will be shocked at what you find. You can’t possibly believe what Ms. Spring or the board tell you. They are covering up something
SHARON K. SUSIE
Unlike felines, article wasn’t well-balanced
In this short and painfully unbalanced article, you have fallen well short of meeting your ethical responsibility to serve the public’s best interests and have betrayed the trust that the public places in your paper to provide unbiased and factual information.
If this had been an editorial, the case might have been different. Indeed what this article does is nothing short of aiding the dubious efforts of a half-dozen board members and administrative staff to operate in secrecy and misdirect any serious public scrutiny with inflammatory and totally unfounded claims as well as falsehoods and obfuscation of facts.
How is it that in the preparation of this article you failed to investigate the board and director’s:
• Refusal to produce federally required documents that all nonprofit organizations must have available for public inspection during all regular hours of operation?
• Refusal to meet openly with any number of the dozens and dozens of concerned volunteers and donors?
• Refusal to meet with a lawyer that several concerned volunteers retained in an effort to force the production of financial documents required by law as well as initiating some level of communication since the board and executive director refused to return all phone calls, e-mails and correspondence?
• Refusal to enter into any form of mediation as proposed by a nationally recognized animal shelter organization?
Rather than “Euthanasia now an option” as the headline, a more accurate headline would have been: “Total lack of financial accountability now an option for nonprofit group taking in $500,000 from the Tucson community annually.”
You might consider running a follow-up article and this time do some actual investigating. The fact that you showed enough interest to run any story about this scandalous situation encourages me to give you the benefit of the doubt.
GARY L STANFIELD
Cat health assessments could set the fur flying
I worked at the Hermitage before all the drama occurred. I have never met more caring or patient people than Paula, Debbie and Katy. Just because you love the animals does not mean you are a hoarder. These women were always the first to celebrate when an animal was adopted.
These dedicated people knew each of the 50-something black cats, what medicine they took or what kind of background they had.
If 100 percent of the staff is gone, how are they telling those cats apart? Who can tell which cats have which problems to tell prospective adopters, and are they really getting told all the problems?
I am deeply disturbed and think that the only solution is to let someone in who knows the cats to find out just how many were “too sick” to live. I think this is everyone’s greatest concern: How many cats have disappeared?
LACEY MASTROBERTE
9 lives a myth: ‘No kill means just that’
I found the article to be quite slanted. Ms. Spring’s comments about previous employees and volunteers are absurd.
I worked for the shelter for three years and volunteered for a couple more. Never have I seen anyone on staff or off abuse the cats. Everyone seemed to have getting any and all of the cats into a forever home their goal.
Until now, I have been a supporter and donor. But with all the garbage and lies spewing from their font, I can’t continue to give my support. No kill means just that.
I hope you will dig out what is really happening at the Hermitage and give some balanced coverage to this deplorable situation. I want to see what should be public records and get some answers to questions concerning what is happening to the cats supposedly in their care.
CHAR SELLECK
