More injured and euthanized animals

Why does this sound familiar?

After a 2 1/2-hour closed-door board meeting Wednesday, SPCA of Niagara board president Bruno Scrufari III announced the request for the probe, in the wake of charges by board member Kathy Paradowski, former veterinary technician Kari E. McAlee-Miller and others that animals were unnecessarily euthanized and that injured animals brought to the shelter were left untreated.

There are a few differences from the local situation here.

Thomas J. Prohaska wrote yesterday for BuffaloNews.com, SPCA in Erie County to probe charges against Faso: Niagara board president announces request for investigation of claims,

Barbara Carr, executive director of the SPCA Serving Erie County, said her board of directors, which meets today, would have to approve the investigation, but she doesn't expect any difficulty in winning approval.

There will be at least one key condition: "I wouldn't do an investigation unless the document we produced was made public," Carr said.

The relevant local authorities welcome an investigation and insist on making the results public. Imagine that!

And, according to Dave McKinley yesterday at wgrz.com, Niagara Co. SPCA Approves Outside Investigation Of Its Animal Shelter

Scrufari spoke with reporters Wednesday, following a 2-1/2 hour, closed door emergency meeting of the board, in which 9 of its 10 members participated.

"At this point we have not been able to verify any of the accusations, including the issue of the healthy animals being euthanized," Scufari said.

But he also says the matter is far from being closed.

"So, what we have done is requested the Erie County SPCA to perform an independent investigation of some of the issues that have been presented in the (media) and by former employees."

OK, that part about "we have not been able to verify" sounds familiar.

But the parts about going ahead and holding a special meeting to approve an investigation, and explicitly calling in an outside agency to do the investigation, those just don't sound like the Lowndes County way.

But they could be.

-jsq