Letter: Shelter, rescue group work together
High salaries at Hempstead Animal Shelter
Newsday reported Jan. 29 that nine Hempstead Animal Shelter employees were paid more than $100,000 in 2010, and that its $3-million payroll equaled New York City's 138-shelter system and dwarfed the total budgets of each of the eight other municipal shelters on Long Island.
Video | Photos | Town shelter budgets/salaries | Related story
This American Terrier mix waits to be adopted from the Town of Hempstead Animal Shelter in Wantagh. (Jan. 26, 2011)
Credit: Newsday/J. Conrad Williams Jr.
Regarding your editorial "Kinder, gentler shelters" [July 3], partnerships between rescue groups and town shelters can work. This has been shown at the Town of North Hempstead Animal Shelter in Port Washington, where a 10-year partnership exists with The Shelter Connection, a volunteer group.
The group provides trained volunteers as adoption advisers to the public and as dog handlers to socialize the dogs, give them exercise and offer basic obedience training.
My group finances medical care that is beyond the town shelter's budget, through our Mend-A-Paw fund. The Shelter Connection also supplements the food budget to allow the purchase of more nutritious food and pays for shelter improvements to enhance the quality of life for the shelter dogs.
For the past 10 years, the shelter has not had to euthanize an adoptable dog. Dogs have lived at the shelter for as long as three years until a suitable home is found.
Rescue groups are welcomed at the shelter, and periodic well-attended Breed Rescue Days are held to educate the public about rescued dogs.
Robert Slifkin, Greenvale
Editor's note: The writer is the president of The Shelter Connection.
