San Francisco, CA: A lot of pit bulls seem to be ‘disappearing’ at San Francisco Animal Control . In the past couple of weeks while trying to locate Charlie, the missing AmStaff who spent so many months in a dark cell at SFACC, other Pet Harbor pit bulls are showing up missing as well.
Charlie is ordered to go to sanctuary by the courts with input from owner David Gizzarelli. However, Gizzarelli reportedly has not had his calls returned by SFACC director Rebecca Katz and Charlie does not show up on Pet Harbor, the national database for shelter animals.
Instead, daily intake reflects scared-looking pit bulls, some with only a number to identify them. The software used to upload incoming animals, Chameleon, costs taxpayers around $9800. The idea is to lower the number of animals being euthanized in the city’s animal pound.
Instead, only one or two pit bull type breeds have been made adoptable for the past couple of weeks. What has happened to the others is anyone’s guess, but without being made available for adoption, the prospect is rather dim.
To find out what is happening at the shelter in a city named for St. Francis, a Google search provided comments and reviews from and about director Rebecca Katz. The Examiner’s own Nathan Winograd published an in-depth review.
“Katz has proven herself to be a misleading defender of the status quo who wants to maintain her discretion to avoid doing what is in the best interests of animals and kill them needlessly. In other words, she is cut from the same cloth as the person she replaced…. having replaced the anti-No Kill Carl Friedman, who retired after two decades at the helm.”
In the article, “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss,” Winograd goes on to say, “Even though she is the director of a public agency which is supposed to be accountable to the people she has pledged to serve; even though her agency is supposed to reflect their values; and even though she has been entrusted with millions of dollars of their money every year and should use those dollars to fulfill their vision, she refuses.”
“Instead, Katz demanded the right to continue killing animals and demanded that taxpayers and animal lovers stop criticizing her agency. For someone with so many demands against others, Katz refused to accept any demands on her agency or her power. Going down the list of programs animal lovers want to legislate, Katz said those who want these animals saved should save them themselves.”
“In reality, she does not. The bottom line is that Katz does not appear to want any accountability in how many and why animals are being killed under her watch.”
According to a recent SF Gate piece, “"Putting a dog in a kennel is a disservice to the dog, any dog," says Rebecca Katz, director of San Francisco Animal Care and Control. "We're pit bull advocates over here. We try to change perceptions of pit bulls in general.”
What is Katz’s definition of ‘advocate?’ Agreed, putting a dog in a kennel might be a disservice, but euthanasia without a proper temperament test and opportunity to find a good home is a much more serious option.
Surely, all of these ‘missing’ dogs at SFACC did not fall out of the parameters of ‘behavior’ and ‘medical.’ Surely, some of these dogs were adoptable and could have been adopted to a nice home in a city with a population of 805,235.
Please share your thoughts and opinions regarding current status of stray and unwanted pit bulls in San Francisco in the comments section following the article.
Cindy Marabito of Reunion Rescue writes the American Pit Bull Examiner stories to save lives. Every click on a story donates to the animals.
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