Ed Sayres Is Full Of Shit

My wife just fowarded this Ed Sayres penned piece in the Huffington Post.

Remember when I wrote that Mayor Bloomberg was a piece of shit? Well, his buddy Ed Sayres is full of shit...

Where do I begin? Okay, let's begin at the beginning. Sayres says...

"New York City has the lowest per capita rate of killing homeless dogs and cats by animal shelters, according to the latest findings of cities studied by Animal People, the leading independent newspaper providing original investigative coverage of animal issues worldwide..."

Knowing what I know about the state of NYC's shelter system, this doesn't exactly make me all warm and fuzzy about our system as much as it scares me about what's going on outside of NYC. I mean, seriously, are other cities killing animals that rescuers are on their way to get? Do their Executive Directors (Hi Julie!) blame the rescuers, as Julie Bank did in that article rather than take some responsibility for not having any back-up plan in place? Anyway...

Then, he hits us with these statistics...

"...Data in the July/August 2012 issue of Animal People shows that New York City's shelters now kill 1 dog or cat for every 1,000 people (a 1.0 per capita kill rate), which makes New York the most successful city in the country in saving homeless animals. This is a stunning turnaround for a city that had a 5.5 per capita kill rate in 1995; a 2.6 per capita kill rate in 2005; and a 2.1 per capita kill rate in 2008..."

You can't argue with stats, can ya? Well....

Couple of things ...

I love how Sayres uses 1995 as the base mark for when things were at its worst. That was just after the ASPCA quit running the NYC shelter system, basically because it was hurting their precious money-making image. So, basically, if things were terrible, it was the ASPCA's fault.

Also, Sayres cant be this stupid. He claims that the kill rate is going down per capita from year to year. Gee, I wonder if the fact that the NYC ACC's hours have been cut back, as have their field operations had anything to do that. Does he think it's a coincidence that there has been less intake the last couple of years? In this economy? Please...

Also, the entirety of any reduction in the kill rate can be traced back to the rescue groups (assisted by the Mayor's Alliance and Maddie's Fund). The ASPCA helps to the tune of a total of $1MM a year...that's out of revenues that exceed $100MM a year. I'd love to know how much of that $100MM can be traced out of New York.

Anyway, Sayres trumpets himself and the ASPCA as being some sort of leading advocate of the no-kill movement, and yet, his organization has killed most legislation that no-kill advocates claim would help. For example, see Oreo's Law, which he may've wanted to kill due to the ASPCA being the one's responsible for killing Oreo.

Why is he writing this fluff piece about the NYC rescue scene? I think there are two reasons.

One - Sayres is leaving at the end of this year and he wants his legacy to be as clean as possible (impossible in NY to anyone who knows how little he has helped our shelter system by enabling the status quo). Everyone wants to go out on top... I may disagree with him, but I can't blame him.

and

Two - He throws in a generous (and well deserved) plug to Maddie's Fund, which helps a heck of a lot more than the ASPCA does. Maddie's Fund recently dropped one of its specified grants benefitting NYC's animals. I can't help but wonder if there is a fear they will pull out entirely, especially given Maddie's CEO Richard Avenzino's tiring of the crap he has to put up with in regards to our dysfunctional system. A lot of people have been clamoring for them to use their muscle for change, but quite frankly, I worry about pushing them too far.

All I can say is, God help us if Maddie's Fund totally pulls out.

Harris Bloom
Founder/President
www.stewietotherescue.org