This story comes via BCTV’s website. A puppy was killed along the Fifth Street Highway this past Monday night while onlookers tried to save its life. As the author states, she and others tried in vain to catch the puppy throughout the day. Numerous calls were placed to animal welfare agencies but no aid was received from any. In the end, as you will read, the puppy was accidently hit and killed by a man. A man who was extremely shaken up by what had transpired.
Could this death have been prevented? Who let this dog down and allowed this puppy to live a short life and cruel death? Did the puppy belong to anyone? If so, have they come forward? Did the puppy escape from its home? Since the puppy was out all day, you would think someone had been looking for his/her puppy. If the puppy did have a home, do they now know their puppy is dead?
What about the animal welfare agencies? Are they blameless or is it a matter of being underfunded, understaffed and overwhelmed by the number of cases, in this case, the ARL has to handle on a daily basis. Were the phone calls handled properly? The Humane Society lost all contracts to all municipalities and townships in Berks County to handle animal control issues to the ARL. The ARL is saddled with all of these responsibilties. Is this too much for this small agency to handle?
Could this puppy’s death have been prevented by anyone?? You tell me.
By Erica Vinskie-Cinelli: The black and tan pup with the blue collar seen canvassing a Muhlenberg Township neighborhood on Monday, May 9, would have made a fine pet.
The dog was likely, very recently, someone’s pet, but by nightfall the animal would be dead.Here’s how a confused, chaotic patchwork of local animal welfare agencies failed to act on this dog’s behalf.
Neighbors and I spotted the miniature breed shortly after 10 a.m. circling the vicinity of the Muhlenberg Township swimming pool on Darby Road. With no owner in sight, I made several fruitless attempts to lure the frightened creature into my garage using canned cat food.
When the animal approached dangerously close to the bustling Fifth Street Highway, I immediately sought help from animal control.The website of the Humane Society of Berks County directs all persons in Berks County municipalities to report stray dogs to the Pennsylvania Bureau of Dog Law Enforcement.
While the agency’s name sounds intimidating, the woman who answered the phone in Harrisburg, Cheryl, was far less so. She gave me the number of Orlando — the officer responsible for animal control in my area of Berks County.Readers who themselves have experienced the bureaucratic “run around” know how often it begins with an ostensibly reasonable request to call another person, department or agency for assistance.
When Orlando’s phone rang and rang without answer, I phoned Harrisburg again. The now exasperated Cheryl said she would try alternate means to connect with Orlando. This was only the beginning of an eight-hour ordeal that would ultimately fail to bring the dog the protection it so desperately needed.An hour passed, and I received a call, not from the elusive Orlando, but from a different animal control officer. The woman on the phone told me that “someone in Harrisburg” had instructed her to call me.
Since she had been given no further information, I explained the increasingly perilous situation of the dog. She revealed that Orlando was on vacation and that his voicemail should have indicated this (there was no voicemail message).
She directed me to call the Animal Rescue League (ARL) in Shillington and explained that in 2009, the organization was given a grant for picking up strays in my area of Berks. She apologized for not having the number on hand in her truck.
The homepage at BerksARL.org features many of the organization’s estimable activities, but animal control service is not prominent among them.http://berksarl.org/The minutes I spent searching the site for the agency’s main number seemed like hours, and the still more minutes spent listening to an inordinately long recorded list of phone extensions seemed an eternity.
In utter frustration, I dialed the agency’s emergency after-hours number and was treated to yet another voice recording. I left a harried message.Within ten minutes, an animal control officer called me back. Unfortunately, she would prove less than helpful. If the dog would not allow me near it, the officer explained, there is nothing more that she could do.
The only equipment available to her is a net with a three-foot reach that she carries on her truck.I begged her to “at least” drive through my neighborhood and see if she could spot the dog. My pleading was to little avail; she was noncommittal.
Meanwhile, as I would later learn, the employees of the Temple Eyeland optical store were watching in helpless horror as the little dog darted back and forth across the four-lane Fifth Street highway.
A neighbor coming home on her lunch break stopped me in my front yard to tell me she almost caused an accident by swerving to miss the dog in the roadway.With my frustration now turning to rage, I called the ARL emergency number again and left an angry message warning that the next call would be a request to scrape the dog’s carcass off of the highway.
Within minutes of this most recent voicemail message, an animal control agent named Trisha called me back. I beseeched Trisha to help, but apparently her hands were tied too. She explained that it was now 2 p.m., and she was in Wernersville with another commitment in Northern Berks immediately following.
She would not be able to get to my area today. Her best advice: start feeding the dog (something I had been trying to do since that morning) and try to get him to come into my yard (ditto). If I manage to contain him, I should call ARL.
And one final piece of advice from Trisha: if the dog is killed, don’t call ARL. Another agency handles road kill.As dusk fell, several neighbors now home from work attempted heroic tactics to corral and rescue the evasive little dog. A few managed to get within a few feet of it — close enough for a net with a three-foot reach to ensnare the pup.
None of us, however, were equipped with a net like those carried by animal control officers on their trucks.Alas, after nightfall, just as we suspected would happen, the black and tan pup made one final attempt to dash across the Fifth Street Highway where it intersects with Euclid Avenue.
Children playing nearby witnessed the incident. The six-foot-plus driver of the Dodge Ram pickup that hit the dog in the dark roadway shook and sobbed as he handed the lifeless little body over to my neighbor for burial.
Yes, the dog could have made a fine pet, and more than a few neighbors were eager to take it in.
I have learned from experience that animal welfare agencies like ARL are staffed mostly by people who care deeply about animals. These operations are often underfunded, understaffed, and ill-equipped; they need the support of local and state governments and of individuals.
If this defenseless dog were abandoned, then the responsibility for its death ultimately falls on its thoughtless owners.
And yet, animal welfare agencies exist, in large part, because people pursue misguided actions that harm animals. It is the job of these agencies and of their officers to come to the aid and protection of endangered animals within their jurisdiction. On Monday, they failed in that responsibility, and a little pup paid with its life.
(Erica Vinskie-Cinelli lives in Temple.)