What is really going on in New Orleans

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What is really going on in New Orleans

Wed Nov 9, 2005 12:02

What is really going on in New Orleans

After reading your November 13 editorial of 2001 I was enlightened about the Red Cross and and other large organizations. I thought you should know about what is really going on in New Orleans with two other large organizations.

Following Katrina I have been working closely with first responder animal rescuers. They are to this day still on the triage site bringing in abandoned animals that have been left behind by evacuees and then abandoned once again by the Humane Society of the US and the ASPCA.

Both organizations, as you well know, receive millions of donations each year from all over the country. Following their huge campaign for assistance after Katrina, through Rita and Wilma, many more millions were donated and earmarked by contributors specifically for the animals left behind. Unfortunately this money is not being filtered down to the volunteers and other small volunteer organizations who gave up jobs and left behind their own families from many different states in order to help in New Orleans. Even under these extraordinary circumstances politics still gets in the way of the HSUS and the ASPCA supporting those going in the crisis area to save the animals. These volunteers live in deplorable conditions and often give up their own food for an animal.

The small animal rescuers and independent volunteers who are in New Orleans today have been there since the very beginning. They went into the flooded areas days before the Humane Society went in and began pulling out pets left behind on roofs, and car tops, trapped in trees without food or water. They went in while the Red Cross boats were returning empty because pet owners refused to leave their pets behind and instead of bring them out together they left them behind until the National Guard forced the people to leave without their animals.

Now that the media and tv cameras have gone off to new stories so have the large organizations. The HSUS is no where to be seen. Nor have they been since a few weeks following the disaster. They simply stopped rescuing and stopped sending vets and vet techs and supplies including vital medicines to the HS of Louisiana shelter set up in Tylerstown, MS. They have never assisted the triage center set up behind the Winn Dixie in New Orleans just steps from the streets of New Orleans. It was these courageous volunteers who climbed through muck and dead carcases, human and animal alike to pull out, coax out or humanely trap those animals still locked in bathrooms or chained to porches of collapsed houses. The heat was unbearable, the stench overwhelming but the one thought running through each of these brave souls was "save all the animals", leave none behind. When shelter space became scarce they transported them to other stats, vigilantly sought foster homes and new permanent families to adopt. They begged and pleaded with pet food companies, vets and vet suppliers, dog associations, the Cub Scouts and anyone who might be able to help even a little. It was totally unselfish and all for the animals. They left their pride behind in the mud and will continue their plea until all the animals are saved. Still, while all this is going on there is no HSUS personnel, money or supplies. No one has seen the ASPCA either. They simply left and never returned - as if this crisis were anywhere near over.

Perhaps all the money donated by children's piggy banks to help the Katrina animals is being sent overseas? What else would be new?

A camera crew could do a terrific film which could easily be seen on PBS, the Today Show, Larry King, CNN 360 degrees,etc.

It would be a real eye opener to all those who traditionally give huge amounts of money and grants to these organizations to know the truth. You can tell it!

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Hurricane Katrina: FEMA Officials Wouldn't Listen:
Who is to blame for the slow response to Hurricane Katrina? Watch Clip below:
HTTP://www.apfn.org/APFN/KATRINA.HTM

Feds are treating Louisiana like enemy —Bob Marshall, Times-Picayune, Wed Nov 9 12:48