NYC ACC Thinks It Is Above Public Input. Here's Your Chance to Prove Otherwise.
After another week of overseeing the slaughter of adoptable companion animals, like Syrian and Onyx, the NYC ACC board will convene on June 21.
Note: The Scoop New York will not be publishing next week, as I will be on the road collecting material for future stories, including a wrap of the NYC animal control board meeting. I’ll be back with that one and more the following week. Thank you and see you then. — BA
Headlines from Buffalo to Brooklyn
It’s Friday, June 14, 2024. This is The Weekly Poop.
This week, the outside world learned that the entity currently and speciously known as Animal Care Centers of NYC killed Syrian and Onyx.
I intended to write up their stories myself, but the memorial email dispatched by city advocate Deborah Tanzer said it better than I could.
Seven year old Syrian is a beautiful girl who has lost her home and owner due to eviction. Despite her challenging circumstances, Syrian remains a sweet and loving dog. During intake, her tail wagged and she was easy to handle, approaching staff with a wiggly body when given water and a bone treat. She’s soft, wiggly, and seeks attention and pets from those she trusts. Syrian is kid-friendly and house trained, and she loves car rides, squeaky toys, and watermelon. She’s known for giving hugs and kisses. She is playful, and affectionate. She enjoys looking out the window during car rides and playing with durable, squeaky toys. When told to go to bed, she adorably picks up her blanket and brings it to her bed. Her favorite snacks include broccoli, cauliflower, squash, sweet potatoes, watermelon, cantaloupe, mango, and strawberries. But she is not thriving in the strange and chaotic shelter environment and ACC is going to kill this wonderful dog.
He’s just 24 months old. Tolerant of strangers, playful with children and familiar dogs, his resume of skills is perfect. He is affectionate and easygoing, nothing bothered him, and he just wanted to be wherever his people were. He spent a lot of time in his living room just lounging about. He didn’t pull on leash when on walks! A lover of car rides and peanut butter, he just wanted to live out his life with the family he loved. Sounds perfect right? And yes, Onyx is perfect, like many dogs who end up at the shelter through absolutely NO fault of their own. But in shelter, Onyx is terrified. He is overwhelmed, lost, searching every face for the people he hoped would return. for him. Onyx is truly a total sweetheart but ACC is going to kill him.
Every companion animal that passes through NYC ACC has a similarly heartbreaking story. Thousands of them every year are executed, like Syrian and Onyx, for the offense of being abandoned, or never loved to begin with.
At this writing, there are at least 26 cats and dogs on death row at the “care center,” including Tommy, a 5-year-old lab mix targeted for extermination because he is scared; Kushina, a pit mix just shy of five who is physically healthy but losing her mind after months at ACC; and Melda, still a puppy at just over a year old, on the execution list simply because ACC has failed to place her after two months.
On the cat wing are McKenzie, Seashell, Newton, Zion, Sadie, Muffin, and Kitty Pancake, all about to die for “behavior," which is ACCspeak for mortal fear. Another cat, Missy Marbles, is to be put to death because she has a nasal infection and is not eating.
These names, these cats and dogs, these stories, are just a sample from one of three rounds of weekly killings at ACC.
It is crushingly easy to imagine the confusion and fear in their last moments, with no one to save them from strangers paid by you and me to drain the life from their faces and dump them in a bag to be burned like garbage in a pile.
It seems unfathomable that human beings are capable of such barbarism until you remember that people work in slaughterhouses too.
You wouldn’t know it from its 30-year history of ineptitude, malfeasance and abject cruelty, but NYC ACC is accountable to the public. And one week from today, New Yorkers will get a face-to-face with the people who oversee the carnage, when the NYC ACC board convenes its next meeting.
“As always,” said ACC spokesperson Katy Hansen, responding to a query from The Scoop New York, “the June board meeting will be open to public comment.”
Good to hear. We’ll see what form that input takes during the meeting.
TSNY also asked why the meeting would not be streamed for those who can’t attend in person, to which Hansen replied: “The meeting will be held in person.” We asked, again, why the meeting won’t be streamed. Hansen had yet to reply at publication time.
If you get the idea that the ACC board isn't terribly interested in what the public knows or thinks about how they're running a multi-billion dollar taxpayer funded operation, you would be about 100 percent correct.
Now is the time to make sure they hear you. The NYC ACC board meeting will be held on Friday, June 21, at 9:30 a.m. at the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, 42-09 28th Street, 3rd Floor, conference room 3-32, in Long Island City.
See you there.
Update 6/19/24: ACC spokesperson Katy Hansen told The Scoop New York that the ACC board does not stream its board meetings because “We prefer to hold the meeting in person.”
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Here’s the latest New York companion animal news:
The person behind New York’s first no-kill shelter tells the story of how he did it — overnight.
The Rochester kill pound has shut down for a week because, according to the pound, staff members got COVID.
Related: How realistic are new statewide shelter standards with minimal help from Albany?
Here are some cats and dogs waiting for adoption in Long Island.
A New York hospital chain allows emotional support dogs in its postpartum units.
A NYC house call vet has written a memoir.
Los Angeles competes with NYC for shittiest major U.S. city to be a homeless companion animal.
This week on The Scoop New York
Albany Lawmakers to Homeless and Abused Cats and Dogs: Drop Dead
It wasn’t just SARA. State legislators chose not to pass other bills that could have helped companion animals who are fighting for their lives.
Food recalls
The FDA issued no new pet food recalls this week.