So sad. I wish this city would figure it's budget out. What a mess they are

But , hell … we got a New Clock over City Hall ! And yes I know those were ARPA funds . But let’s see here a Clock ,that really who looks at , or a brand new Animal Shelter , convince me go ahead and try ! Elmira’s City Council has been way too busy with personnel hijinks and bitch slapping each other over the last few years to give a damn about conditions at the Animal Shelter ! And yes that facility has been in a sad ass state for quite some time and needs a complete tear down and replace ! But , the fault of all this is not on the City itself but also with the citizens of the area , not all mind you , that are constantly trading dogs between each other or just letting the dogs run at large with no vaccinations or care !

I’m going to stop right here thank you …

Edited September 2Sep 2 by Hal

Animal control in Chemunf county has always been substandard and under funded. I wish I knew the solution.

For all the keyboard warriors that championed the Horseheads shelter....their "undying" support seened stop at actual financial support. I was surprised theyblated as long as they did. And it's no wonder Elmira has struggled so much since they closed.

The local shelters are struggling at capacity and have been for some time. Meanwhile, the Chemung County SPCA imports puppies from out of the area to adopts out.

42 minutes ago, MsKreed said:

Animal control in Chemunf county has always been substandard and under funded. I wish I knew the solution.

For all the keyboard warriors that championed the Horseheads shelter....their "undying" support seened stop at actual financial support. I was surprised theyblated as long as they did. And it's no wonder Elmira has struggled so much since they closed.

That exact thing popped into my head today. Fundraising, events, request for donations and on and on. Granted, it seems there may have been some infighting with the board and the Village did not support them at all which wasn't helpfule.

23 minutes ago, Chris said:

The local shelters are struggling at capacity and have been for some time. Meanwhile, the Chemung County SPCA imports puppies from out of the area to adopts out.

They are a useless organization as far as I'm concerned. I will donate "items" to them through various fundraisers, but they are not getting cash. They are funded through their national organization. They are supposed to be education organization now, but I have yet to see that.

55 minutes ago, Chris said:

The local shelters are struggling at capacity and have been for some time. Meanwhile, the Chemung County SPCA imports puppies from out of the area to adopts out.

Seriously?

WTaF?? They've never been able to manage the animals already here and are importing more issues?

Years ago, when I lived in Big Flats and the SPCA was "in charge" of animal control, we begged them for help with a feral cats that a neighbor was feeding/fostering.

They fed them, but we were told they couldn't be held accountable for vaccinations, etc because they didn't acknowledge ownership. Three or four (unvaccinated) cats were aggressively marking my kids' sandbox and our yard as their territory. Hissing at and attacking anyone who came near them.

The SPCA flat out refused to trap them. It was our responsibility to collect and bring them to the SPCA. The situation went on all summer. Until another neighbor's kid was bitten. Then it was all hands on deck. The local news was broadcasting warnings of potential rabies exposure and they sent out a troop of employees to trap, euthanize and test the beasts.

Because removing them before they posed a public health threat wasn't their concern.

9 hours ago, MsKreed said:

Seriously?

Yep. I don’t follow them anymore because it got to be too much for me but for a while there they had van loads of puppies coming from places like down south and adopting them out.

The last time I could find for sure was in July:

To be fair, they’re not the only ones who do it. But with the other, what, two remaining shelters bursting at the seams, it’s not a good look. someone did call them out on it and here’s the explanation they gave:

The short version: we're actually two completely separate organizations with different legal structures, so it's not as easy as "making room."

The Chemung County SPCA is an independent, private nonprofit. We take in owner surrenders, and we're not under any municipal contract or funding obligation to the City of Elmira. Elmira Animal Shelter is run by the City of Elmira through the Department of Public Works, funded by the municipal budget, and handles stray and animal control intake under its own staffing, space, and legal requirements.

Because we're separately funded and separately governed, we can't simply absorb their overflow.

We know it's frustrating when it feels like a shared problem should have a shared solution. If you want to help both organizations at once, supporting adoptions, fostering, or donations at either shelter goes a long way.

1 hour ago, Chris said:

The short version: we're actually two completely separate organizations with different legal structures, so it's not as easy as "making room."

The Chemung County SPCA is an independent, private nonprofit. We take in owner surrenders, and we're not under any municipal contract or funding obligation to the City of Elmira. Elmira Animal Shelter is run by the City of Elmira through the Department of Public Works, funded by the municipal budget, and handles stray and animal control intake under its own staffing, space, and legal requirements.

Because we're separately funded and separately governed, we can't simply absorb their overflow.

We know it's frustrating when it feels like a shared problem should have a shared solution. If you want to help both organizations at once, supporting adoptions, fostering, or donations at either shelter goes a long way.

Looks like a lawyerly response. And it all comes down to funding.

The publicly owned shelter is funded by limited tax allocations. And judging from their inaction when they've been under a municipal contract....any contracts the SPCA had/has with various municipalities aren't likely to be even close to as lucrative as whatever grants the ASPCA offers them to take in relocated animals.

One has to imagine that a "non-profit" can afford to be pretty persuasive when it has a $450 million annual income and can afford to fill primetime programming with insanely long celebrity ads across major networks and platforms

Edited September 3Sep 3 by MsKreed

I have always wondered if, when local fundraisers were held for the Elmira Animal Shelter, if the money went directly to the Animal Shelter. Or, did the money go to the City’s General Fund to be disbursed to the Shelter.

12 hours ago, Ann said:

I have always wondered if, when local fundraisers were held for the Elmira Animal Shelter, if the money went directly to the Animal Shelter. Or, did the money go to the City’s General Fund to be disbursed to the Shelter.

Michelle was thinking today of starting a fundraiser at work for the Elmira Animal shelter and while i feel for those critters( not the ones running it btw) it IS funded through the ELmira City Budget. perhaps the elected officials need to allocate more funds to the shelter rather than some of the other boondoggles of the past/present. i told her if she is so inclined do one for STAC, he has no tax base to run his shelter, and given Elmiras closure, is sure to see an influx....and last i checked hes had no parvo or dog dying in hot car

My guess is that the city has let the issues with the shelter kind of float along, operated more on the monies brought in through contracts with surrounding municipalities. It’s pretty obvious that business model isn’t going to work and we’re seeing the repercussions of that.

Although, I can’t help but question whether these recent issues have anything to do with the leadership. We didn’t see things like this with the previous director, but I’ll concede that it could be a coincidence.

1 hour ago, Chris said:

Although, I can’t help but question whether these recent issues have anything to do with the leadership. We didn’t see things like this with the previous director, but I’ll concede that it could be a coincidence

I have a suspicion that being the case ! In the time between the former director and the present director there was a part time position opening and the lo and behold a full time position shortly after . Then given the pup left in the van to suffer and die from the heat and the deplorable conditions of the shelter itself it all seems to gel . There have been numerous , lesser needed projects done in the City , these monies would have been better spent on improvements to the current shelter ! One example … just drive up through Water St. , all the zig zagging … really ? Then the Charlie Foxtrot diagonal parking on the river side of the street , compressing traffic geezus , how much money was all that and who the Hell does their Engineering on these money sunk projects ? My point if not clear enough is this , enough with City Council bickering and bitch slapping each other , open your money grubbing eyes ,other than the frigging clock , look to MAINTAINING your other properties , particularly up on the DPW end and more to the point … the ANIMAL SHELTER !!

Sorry , Not Sorry to go on so long !

Edited September 4Sep 4 by Hal

12 hours ago, ADAM said:

Michelle was thinking today of starting a fundraiser at work for the Elmira Animal shelter and while i feel for those critters( not the ones running it btw) it IS funded through the ELmira City Budget. perhaps the elected officials need to allocate more funds to the shelter rather than some of the other boondoggles of the past/present. i told her if she is so inclined do one for STAC, he has no tax base to run his shelter, and given Elmiras closure, is sure to see an influx....and last i checked hes had no parvo or dog dying in hot car

Any fundraising I did at work it all went to STAC

I support them both and donate in the manner they have always requested.

Since the city takes EACs money I donate food, cleaning supplies, blankets, gift cards etc. STAC gets the same but I can donate money too.

It's about the animals plain and simple. Not the outrage from social media with only about 3 people who actually know what they are talking about.

All this wailing, moaning and pearl clutching is going to backfire on everyone. The city is gonna say F it and just shut it down, kind of like Horseheads did when people wailed about it.

8 hours ago, KarenK said:

Since the city takes EACs money I donate food, cleaning supplies, blankets, gift cards etc. STAC gets the same but I can donate money too.

Thanks for answering our question or verification of suspicion on donated monies Karen ! Any cash i want to donate will go to STAC from here out . And yes it is all about the animals but , always a but right , it’s these dumbass politicians that control the purse strings and by extension the fates of the dogs and cats . I will admit to my post being a knee jerk reaction and realize it does no or very little good to type my mind but there it is and other than donating pet food or bleach thats all anyone can do especially with this latest of atrocities against dogs and puppies by some fine upstanding citizen. And have you seen the local news tonight about the dog that died in the van from the heat ? The owners went to retrieve the dog and upon showing up to do so , only then was it noticed the dog was not in the building but still in the van … dead ! I would lose my shit completely where that me when those doors were opened and my dog was dead due to someone’s incompetence. Anyway again thanks for that info on donations , I had heard before that all funds had to be given over to the city .

Yea, the dog that died in the van was posted and on the news a few months ago. I do know that whomever filed that suit or someone close to it posted on Elmira Dirty Laundry (not the open forum one) about it yesterday naming names and straight up ripping everyone. I guess I should have screen shot it since its since been deleted. I knew it wouldn't be up long with all the names posted.

9 hours ago, KarenK said:

I do know that whomever filed that suit or someone close to it posted on Elmira Dirty Laundry (not the open forum one) about it yesterday naming names and straight up ripping everyone. I guess I should have screen shot it since its since been deleted. I knew it wouldn't be up long with all the names posted.

As a court filing, it's public record.

The WENY's article has a link to the full document imbedded....... here NOTICE OF CLAIM.

Edited September 5Sep 5 by MsKreed

2 minutes ago, MsKreed said:

As a court filing, it's public record.

The WENY's article has a link to the full document imbedded....... here NOTICE OF CLAIM

Right, the news does. This was more of a personal rant by whom I am assuming might have been the owner or someone close. It did include some ridiculous amount of money as well.

Edited September 5Sep 5 by KarenK

It's so sad. When Animal Control has gotten reports of dogs locked inside a vehicle in Wegman's parking lot, etc.....they have charged the owners criminally. Even without holding a public officer to a higher standard of trust, her actions would result in charges if a civilian had done it.

38 minutes ago, MsKreed said:

It's so sad. When Animal Control has gotten reports of dogs locked inside a vehicle in Wegman's parking lot, etc.....they have charged the owners criminally. Even without holding a public officer to a higher standard of trust, her actions would result in charges if a civilian had done it.

I agree. Granted the charges are not much but it's something but when the let actual people walk free after leaving their kids in hot cars because it was an "accident", I have no hope for humanity.