Humane Society could have taken another path
EDITOR:
I really have to bite my tongue when I see the articles about the Salem Area Humane Society.
It is interesting to see the way this is being "spun" to the public. According to Mrs. Popa, not having their $18,000 per year allowance from the Atchinson Trust is the reason they can't take any more animals.
First of all, that $18,000 is only 25 percent of their budget. The rest of the money would have to be raised. I noticed they had no booth or parade unit during Salem's largest event, the Jubilee, nor did they have one at the Columbiana County Fair.
The public is not going to support a poorly run facility. As an example, when the shelter was visited about a month ago, there were 65 dogs in residence, most not neutered. The noise was so deafening you couldn't hear another person screaming standing just a foot apart. Three dog fights broke out in a two-hour visit. A dog put into this kind of kennel becomes more un-adoptable every day it is there.
Their cry of "no money" is strange, considering they can afford to employ a worker and have money enough to buy property from the city. How they would ever design, build, pay for and manage a new building is beyond me.
As far as turning away 10 animals a day -- big deal. Angels for Animals turns away 200 a day. When we started 11 years ago, we turned away 300-400 per day. No one can take all the animals. This is why Angels and the new Salem Humane Society have aggressive spay-neuter programs. It is much cheaper to spay animals than to deal with their thousands of offspring.
I remember going to their annual meeting in 1989 and being laughed out of the room when we told them we were going to start a shelter where all the pets would be fixed. It took us years to convince them to follow suit.
But the real topper is the fact Angels was willing to improve the SAHS shelter and get it running efficiently. If they had accepted our help, they would be on track right now and gotten their trust money back.
I certainly hope the public does call their local officials, as Mrs. Popa suggested, but to express how they feel about the mismanagement of the shelter.
DIANE LESS-BAIRD
President, Angels for Animals
Greenford
Zoning laws endanger property rights of citizens
EDITOR:
It's not against the law for low income and fixed income citizens to own property. It is against zoning laws if you can't afford to build and keep up your property in the fashion zoning commissioners are accustomed to. These laws are adopted for their use, not yours.
Citizens on fixed incomes without means to comply to the demands of zoning will be forced from their homes. Their property seized then liquidated to the wealthy who have money to build and live as the zoning commission wants. Brookfield Township will eliminate low income residents. These citizens become servants to the exploiters and profiteers who confiscated their land through zoning laws.
Who is going to profit from the many zoning confiscated properties in Brookfield Township?
Karl Marx and Joseph Stalin had zoning long before it raised its ugly in the United States. A study of communism will give you an idea of what zoning has planned for your land. Zoning is a lien against all private property. Your land in hock, your life and money in their control.
Have Brookfield Township residents fallen asleep, letting villains, exploiters, and profiteers take possession of their property and constitutional rights?
Zoning is the viper that bites.
FRANK R. FOX
Masury