What happened to BARC’s millions?

Houston, TX - In 2009, the city of Houston authorized 3.3 million dollars to be spent on much needed renovations for BARC (Houston's animal control facility). Citizens were told that the renovations, to be completed in 2010, would consist of:

1) Add a new modular facility for cat housing;

2) Replace the [dog] kennels in North Kennel with a new facility similar to South Kennel with 200 appropriately sized kennels;

3) Renovate the first floor of North Kennel to include cat condos;

4) Renovate and enlarge the surgery area in North Kennel to enable high volume spay/neuter services (up to 50/day);

5) Improve public access by adding a new parking area.

The dog cages in the North Kennels are absolutely horrible. They are tiny, dark, dank cells that are so small that dog beds won’t even fit. The animals sit on rubber mats that have holes so the water can drain through. Large dogs can’t stand in them without their noses and tails touching each wall. They are so small that many times dogs are forced to stand or sleep in their own waste because there simply is no way to get away from it. (And these dogs are not taken out for walks like those in the South Kennels). I’ve had nightmares about the North Kennels. The scene of a German Shepherd crammed into one of those tiny kennels, so small that he stood on his back feet with his front feet on the kennel door, is forever burned into my brain.

They are so bad that Nathan Winograd called them some of the most poorly designed kennels that he has ever seen. This statement came from a person who has visited “shelters” all over the United States and in other countries.

Needless to say, most citizens who have seen BARC, were overjoyed to learn that the dog kennels in the North Kennels would be gutted and rebuilt into something more humane.

In December 2009, the city also paid two architectural firms over 1.1 million dollars for the renovations at BARC’s current facility (see #69 and #70 on the attached) and for work on the Gragg Park white elephant. Yet, two years later, only one item from the renovation list has been completed and that is the addition of the modular cat building (a portable building with cat cages that was moved onto BARC’s property). None of the other renovations, that are fully funded, have even been started.

In 2009, Annise Parker was asked in a Candidate Questionnaire “Would you support shutting down the North Kennel entirely and building new kennels to replace it?” She responded “Yes, as funds are available.”

Well, millions of dollars have been available since 2009, even before she took office, and in fact the city already paid two firms over $1.1 million dollars in 2009 to do the work. According to Elena Marks 10-08-09 memo, BARC’s money was transferred into accounts under the ARA Department's control. So, why haven’t the Mayor and ARA Director, Alfred Moran, used the millions for the renovations for which it was intended i.e. providing more humane conditions for animals at BARC and providing high volume spay/neuter services so that less animals enter BARC?

Why have animals been forced to live in those deplorable conditions when the money for renovations has been available for 2 years?

What have Parker and Moran been doing with the millions of tax payers funded dollars that were set aside for BARC 2 years ago?

In addition, it appears that the City of Houston authorized payment of another almost ½ million dollars to one architectural firms in August of 2011. That is in addition to the $351,156 that was paid to this firm in 2009 for renovations that have never started. Why the city is paying this firm another almost ½ million dollars when no work was started after the first payment?

In Parker's campaign promises, she said that she "deplores the conditions at BARC". But she has done nothing to improve conditions of the horrendous North Kennels even when the money has been sitting in the ARA Department account for 2 years?

Is this what Parker meant when she said

“If elected mayor, I will do everything within my power to make sure BARC becomes a humane and adequately funded no-kill shelter.”?

Seriously, is this it?

According to a city councilmember’s office, in just the last couple of months, the city has decided to not perform the above renovations at all. They have instead purchased some property next to BARC’s current location and plan to build another adoption facility.

As I have written before, BARC’s current location is not the least bit conducive to adopting out a large number of animals. BARC’s facility is located in a very remote, industrial and economically distressed, part of Houston. The building is hidden away off of a small, deserted, trash strewn, dead-end street (see pictures here). In fact, you would be very hard pressed to find a location that would be worse for adoptions than where BARC sits now.

Annise Parker has even stated that BARC’s out of the way location deters adoptions. Yet, after making this statement, she decides to spend millions of our tax dollars to build another adoption facility IN THE VERY SAME LOCATION. Folks, this isn’t rocket science. If BARC’s out of the way location deters adoptions, and two years after Parker took office, BARC is still killing 1,000 animals every month, in what universe does it make sense to build yet another adoption facility in the very same location?

I thought that the mayor's plans to spend 2 million dollars to build only 70 kennels in another yet remote location at Gragg Park is an incredibly foolish and reckless waste of our tax dollars, (Dallas spent $16 million for a huge, state of the art, shelter with 800-1,000 kennels) but to divert millions of dollars to build another adoption facility in the very same location that she herself admits is failing so miserably BECAUSE of its location, has got to be one of the most ludicrous ideas that I've ever heard.

How many spay/neuters could that $3.3 million have provided by now if the money had been used as originally promised i.e. to enable high volume spay/neuter services? They were planning on performing up to 50 spay/neuters per day. Even if the renovations were completed at the end of 2010, that is 15,000 spay/neuter surgeries that could have been performed to date in 2011. How many litters of puppies and kittens would that have prevented this year and the years to come? How many animals would have been prevented from entering BARC, and the other 4 kill shelters, this year, and the years that follow with those spay/neuters?

In addition, how many cat condos would those millions have bought so that more cats could have a place to live instead of being killed for “lack of space”? Heaven knows that the cats need the additional living space since BARC leaders took away the cats' two free roaming rooms (i.e. LIVING space) so that they could use it for office equipment etc. This was done as soon as the portable cat building was moved onto BARC’s property meaning few, if any, additional cat lives were saved with that expenditure of your tax dollars.

In addition to the above waste of millions, in 2009 the City of Houston was working on a several million dollar grant application through PetSmart Charities. PetSmart worked hard to try to help the city with the grant application process. As part of the grant process, PetSmart required that BARC/city of Houston employees visit a model low cost spay/neuter clinic in North Carolina. Several city employees did travel to the clinic in 2009. Yet, it appears that after that, no one bothered to complete the grant application meaning millions of dollars in spay/neuter funding were lost. This was even after an outside business woman offered to work on the grant to help BARC (she was turned down). This is more millions of dollars that were just wasted instead of being used to save lives.

As an aside, I recently sent a public information request to the city asking for documents concerning this grant. I was told that it would cost $5,757.39 for the city to “search” for the documents.

Do you get the feeling that the city has something to hide? Needless to say, I didn’t pay the city $5,757 to search for documents that I suspect do not exist.

Again, how many low cost spay/neuters could those millions of grant dollars provided to Houstonians by now? How many litters could that have prevented so far, especially in conjunction with the high volume surgery area that the city was “supposed” to renovate at BARC?

The above are more clear signs that Annise Parker and Alfred Moran just do not care about making common sense decisions that would lead to more life saving in the city of Houston, and never intended to keep Parker's No Kill promises.

Moran recently told a reporter that “No one wants to put animals to sleep”. Maybe not, but apparently killing 80,000 animals in the city of Houston every year does not bother Moran and Parker enough to do what we know will make the killing stop.

But then, Moran and Parker aren’t the ones holding the needle every day.

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