At the latest Los Angeles Animal Services Board of Commissioners meeting, numerous volunteers continued bravely bringing their thoughts to the microphone. It’s brave because workplace retaliation is a real thing. Those that would say it isn’t, you are either gullible or you actively work for the department that’s doing the retaliating. Once the latest audio is available I’m going to put together a compilation of some of the statements and add it to this piece so that people can hear them.

I don’t even go to most of the meetings, but when I do they routinely feature lots of public comments coming from current or former volunteers. They are mostly comments that are detailing problems or concerns. At what point does someone have to take some of them seriously? Or are these meetings just a dog and pony show? If the department, and more specifically the Board of Commissioners, actually care about their volunteers then they need to start seriously listening to their grievances.

I mentioned on Tuesday night that the role of the board was to oversee the department. Not the other way around. They are an oversight commission! I ended that statement by turning it into a question. I was genuinely asking. We know what the board is supposed to do but then we also see what it actually does.

The fact remains, someone up the chain has been able to get rid out countless past Commissioners when they begin to ask hard questions or seek certain degrees of accountability. And how are they let go? Much like the volunteers. No acknowledgement of what they’ve brought and/or continue to bring to the table, just that they are no longer needed.

So who is overseeing the department? The department? Does the department have the ability to oversee the commission set up to oversee the department? It sounds funny but these are real questions.

My criticism is leveled knowing that LAAS (city) is clearly ahead of the DACC (county). At least the city has a public meeting, genuine in nature or disingenuous. County has nothing. No way for people to voice their concerns, no way for people to publicly attempt to hold Marcia Mayeda accountable. So for that reason alone, Brenda Barnette has more courage than Marcia Mayeda. That goes recognized by me, for sure.

But for example, Tuesday they had a couple of “dangerous dog” hearings prior to the meeting getting underway. In the first one, it was alleged that a German Shepherd was constantly allowed to run free at a certain residence and had acted aggressively towards certain people. The owners of the dog pointed out that they’ve never even been cited for the dog being loose or biting anyone. What did animal control do? They showed up trying to confiscate the German Shepherd. The woman would not relinquish the dog. They then tried getting her to sign a stipulation contract stating rules that they had set forth. She wouldn’t sign it. She goes to the bathroom and then the officer starts fearmongering her father. They tell him that if he doesn’t sign their stipulation then they will confiscate BOTH of their dogs. WHAT THE FUCK? That is so illegal. One of the dogs wasn’t even involved in any of the complaints, fake or legitimate. So the father signed the stipulation under this threat of seizure. Down the line, the complaining neighbor complains again; animal control comes out and then confiscates BOTH dogs. The city has had them locked in quarantine as “evidence” for over 7 months now.

Just based on that testimony, how is there not a problem with that picture? You’d think that 1 of the Commissioners would say something, right? After all, I believe that 3 of the 5 are attorneys! No one said anything and they voted to uphold the department’s decision by a 5-0 vote. I mean, that is incredible. No due process at all. During my public comment, I tried to point out that if the seizure threat was illegally done then the stipulation that was signed by the father isn’t even valid. Ultimately, the dogs were confiscated because it was alleged that the German Shepherd was in breach of the stipulation. How does no Commissioner not ask of the department what I brought up to them during my public comment? Why do I even have to bring it up? Not to mention, 1 dog isn’t even involved. Further, no one even bothered to ask the father/daughter who was the legal owner of the dogs. Isn’t that relevant as well? It’s just all so crazy to me.

During the general manager’s report, Brenda Barnette mentioned that they’ve created a “Dangerous Dog Committee.” This came as news to me. Then she listed off the members and I was immediately further thrown off. Phyllis Daugherty is somehow a member of this committee. Daugherty is well-known for having an anti-Pit Bull ideology and being a supporter of breed-specific legislation. Barnette is also on the committee and I know that she doesn’t support BSL, but I just can’t understand how Daugherty ends up on a committee such as that one. Certainly, there are actual dangerous individual dogs, that’s a fact. But Daugherty eventually attempting to push breed-oriented ideas onto the committee is something that will also happen, that’s also a fact.

I really want to know how the committee was picked, what are the qualifications required for being on such a committee, and when and where they will meet. Barnette did tell me after the meeting that they’d next meet in January and that they weren’t against adding other members. She said that the ideas they will be pondering will have to do with individual dogs that have records of incident and will not be breed-oriented. She told me that I could attend if I wanted to.

The later agenda had something on it regarding the volunteer program and improving it. This is great. It actually ended up creating a window of opportunity to have pertinent discussion, spurned on by this erroneous report about the volunteer program that was attached to the agenda. In it, it’s claimed that the city currently has 4,137 volunteers in their database. The program’s growth is highlighted by mentioning the 2013 total of 3,264 volunteers and the 2012 total of 1,808 volunteers. It says that their volunteers complete an average of 4,300 hours per month (not including foster volunteer hours). The very next sentence claims that volunteers are asked to complete at least 6 hours per month to remain active in the program.

So hold on, stop right there. If there is 4,137 active volunteers in the system completing at least 6 hours per month then that means that, at minimum, the volunteers in their program should be completing 24,822 hours per month. This report says that they are completing an average of 4,300 hours per month. So in reality, they are (as a whole) completing only 17% of the very minimum amount of hours that the city is giving them credit for in this report. The total amount of volunteers in their system are barely averaging 1 hour per month. That’s what the numbers show. Whomever wrote up this report is either really bad at their job or thinks that the general public are just disengaged zombies.

Further down it claims that each shelter has 1 volunteer orientation per month and “more are added if needed.” This is just not true. Each shelter does not have 1 orientation per month. Not even close. Commissioner Roger Wolfson picks up on all of this fuzzy math and starts questioning the validity of the report. He also disputes the claim that monthly orientations are taking place and directly points to his own experience as a volunteer at the North Central shelter and how it took 4 months to get a class rolling after he applied.

What followed was a great discussion about what can be done to improve things for volunteers, the implementation of classes, the shifting around of responsibilities, etc. It was just talk, but that’s where it starts. Let’s see if anything happens. There’s obviously lots of caring and engaged volunteers who are ready and willing to take on more responsibilities. That’s not to say that there isn’t caring and engaged employees, there’s those, too. Here’s to hoping that something changes for the better.