January/February 1996
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Your high school library can have a free subscription to ANIMAL PEOPLE–– Nonprofit the only independent newspaper covering all the news about animal protection. Organization Send your acceptance to: U.S. Postage ANIMAL PEOPLE, POB 205, Shushan, NY 12873, or fax it to 518-854-9601. Paid ANIMAL PEOPLE has no alignment or affiliation with any advocacy organization. ANIMAL PEOPLE, Out of cod, Canada tells fishers "kill seals" Inc. ST. JOHNS, Newfoundland––Blaming harp seals for a 99% decline in the mass of spawning cod off the Atlantic coast of POB 205, SHUSHAN, NY 12873 Newfoundland, Canadian Fisheries Minister Brian Tobin on [ADDRESS CORRECTION REQUESTED.] December 18 moved to appease out-of-work cod fishers in his home province by expanding the 1996 seal killing quota to 250,000––actually higher than many annual quotas during the peak years of the seal hunt in the 1970s and early 1980s. In effect resuming the all-out seal massacres that prompt- ed international protest until clubbing newborn whitecoats and hunting seals from large vessels was suspended in 1983, Tobin also pledged to maintain a bounty of about 15¢ U.S. per pound for each dead seal landed, and said he would encourage the revived use of large vessels to help sealers attack seal breeding colonies on offshore ice floes. rassed by an International Fund for Animal Welfare campaign The prohibition on killing whitecoats remains in effect, worldwide to expose the lack of market demand for seal products. but only means young seals will be killed not as newborns but as A report on seal marketing strategy commissioned by the Canadian two-week-old beaters, just beginning to molt and crawl. government, published in November 1994, confirmed that more Tobin’s announcement came two months after Tobin and than half of seal product income is derived from the sale of penises the fisheries ministers for the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Norway, to the Asian aphrodisiac trade. At that, the average price paid to and Russia, and a representative from Greenland, agreed on a sealers for seal penises is only $20 to $26. The report found no joint plan to promote sealing––and one month after international viable markets for seal meat, oil, or fur. newswires circulated an unconfirmed report that Canada was close Lack of sales opportunities helped hold the official 1995 to striking a deal to sell up to 250,000 seal carcasses a year to an Atlantic Canada sealing toll to just 67,000, of a quota of 186,000. Harp seal pup. (Photo by Mary Bloom) Asian buyer. The Canadian government has been severely embar- (continued on page 13) ANIMAL PEOPLE News For People Who Care About Animals January/February 1996 Volume V, #1 Federal grand jury indicts top veal feeder ILLEGAL DRUG MAY HAVE TAINTED MEAT M I L W A U K E E ––In the first of an expected series of indictments striking at the brain trust and bankroll of the crate-raised veal and milk-fed spring lamb industries, a federal grand jury empaneled in Milwaukee on December 6 charged the Vitek Supply Corporation, Vitek president Jannes Doppenberg, and Vitek office manager Sherry Steffen with 12 counts of conspiracy, smuggling unapproved drugs into the U.S., and illegally adding the drugs to feed mixtures told to veal and lamb producers throughout the country. A prepared statement from U.S. Attorney Thomas P. Schneider said, "It is alleged in the indictment that the unapproved drugs were shipped to feed companies and growers in Kansas, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and Illinois. Over 1.7 million pounds of Vitek product containing unapproved drugs, valued at over $1.3 million dollars, were sold by Vitek between 1988 and April 1994." Three drugs were involved, explained Schneider. Clenbuterol, a banned but still popular synthetic steroid growth Steve Hindi and Dan Green: the Flying CHARC Squadron. INSIDE enhancer, has also been at the center of recent livestock show and horseracing scan- The King & Duke dals. "Clenbuterol has been associated with the acute poisoning of humans who consumed The Wright stuff meat from clenbuterol-fed animals," Schneider said. In Spain, clenbuterol taint- REND LAKE, Illinois– – C h i c a g o much time into developing the CHARC NIH says probe ing of veal and calf's liver caused 135 people Animal Rights Coalition president Steve remote video and airborne capabilities that to be hospitalized in 1990, and another 140 Hindi, a licensed pilot, on December 16 star- fundraising has lagged. National activist human link to people suffered dizziness, heart palpitations, tled the Illinois Department of Natural groups make extensive use of the CHARC breathing difficulty, shakes, and headaches Resources, hunters culling deer at the Renn videos, but none have funded the equipment mad cow disease from a similar incident in February 1994. Lake Wildlife Refuge, and fellow protesters acquisitions. [Support for CHARC may be The second unapproved drug, by soaring up in a paraglider to videotape the addressed to POB 66, Yorkville, IL 60560.] Avoparcine, is "an antibiotic, which through action from above––as deer fled from the Ironically, the Rend Lake protest Racehorses on a uncontrolled use, may result in strains of sound of the aircraft, away from the hunters. was backed by deer hunters who believed the bacteria resistant to other antibiotics," “This is going to change every- cull was unethical. “I couldn’t believe how PMU line? according to Schneider. thing,” Hindi told ANIMAL PEOPLE. “Air well we were treated by most of the local The third drug, actually a drug fam- power revolutionized warfare, and it’s going hunters,” Hindi said. Local hunters and ily, includes Furaltadone, furazolidona, and to revolutionize protest. No longer can the activists joined on the night of December 14- WHAT THE POLLS nitrofurazone, "all members of a class of DNR and the hunters hide anything from us.” 15 to drive hundreds of deer out of the Rend compounds referred to as nitrofurans," Hindi’s flight was brief, due to Lake refuge before the cull hunters were TELL US Schneider said. "Though previously technical problems with the brand-new equip- allowed in. Noise grenades set off by alarm approved, since January of 1992, all three ment. By the time repairs were made, the clocks kept the deer from returning to the drugs have been unapproved due to substan- wind had become too strong to attempt fur- refuge during the three-day hunt. In conse- Working with tial evidence that they are carcinogenic. ther flights. However, Hindi said, CHARC quence, Hindi said, the cull hunters killed The indictments are a milestone for expects to have two paragliders in the air over only eight or nine deer total, compared with the San Francisco-based Humane Farming future major events, each able to stay aloft an expected bag of 12-plus deer per day. elephants Association and HFA chief investigator Gail for two hours at a time. The only significant “It was a complete defeat for the DNR,” (continued on page 5) problem, he reported, is that he’s put so Hindi said. 2 - ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 1996 Editorial The King, the Duke, and who gets the money North Shore Animal League president John Stevenson spends more money on ani- The obtuseness of some groups in steadfastly promoting punitive enforcement instead of mal sheltering, neutering, and adoption promotion than anyone else ever. He spends more, incentives for compliance seems otherwise difficult to explain. Certainly the belligerent anti- too, to help other animal shelters, through North Shore’s Pet Savers Foundation subsidiary. ESA attitude of much of the present Congress has boosted environmental fundraising out of To support $33 million a year in animal rescue work, Stevenson further spends $10 million on the prolonged funk that followed Earth Day 1990. fundraising––more than any other hands-on animal care organization. • Are some self-proclaimed humane advocacy groups knowingly promoting policies Stevenson strongly favors donor accountability and strict public oversight of that perpetuate pet overpopulation, to keep themselves in business? Judging by the peeved fundraising, to ensure that charities do the work they claim to be doing. The North Shore and response of certain organizations to early neutering, low-cost neutering, mobile clinics, high- Pet Savers IRS Form 990 filings are among the most detailed of the many we monitor. But, volume adoption, off-premise adoptions, neuter/release, breed rescue, feral cat rescue, and as a nationally respected expert on nonprofit law long before assuming his present post, who the no-kill initiatives of the North Shore Animal League and San Francisco SPCA, continuing spends much commuting time contemplating how to make charities in general more honest, years after each tactic has proved itself, and considering those same perpetually nay-saying Stevenson admits to being perplexed by donor attitudes. The most important number in the organizations’ emphasis on fundraising, it is hard not to wonder. annual ANIMAL PEOPLE charts on animal protection spending, he believes, should be not Finally, when nonprofit institutions seem to act from self-interest more than altru- the percentage of receipts an organization spends to raise more money, but rather the amount ism, altruists are more easily inspired to form their own institutions––and so are the self-inter- of money actually spent to fulfill charitable purposes. ested, attracted by the prospect of tax-exempt easy money. While the altruists struggle to do a “What does it matter to donors how much we spend on fundraising,” he asks, “if we lot with little, fundraising according to need, the self-interested just raise funds fulltime, can put another million dollars into it and get back two or three million extra to spend on pro- diverting out of the cause an ever increasing share of the donated resources.