Thanks to the Brussels office of “Vier Photen” the Intergroup on the Welfare and Conservation of Animals in the European Parliament has shown serious interest in the stray dogs problem in Bulgaria. The members of the European Parliament are very concerned with the possibility of changes in the Animal Protection Act which will legitimize the useless mass destruction of homeless dogs in the country. As a result, the Prime Minister of Bulgaria has received a letter, signed by the Chairman of the Intergroup, Mr. Dan Jorgensen.

READ THE FULL LETTER HERE

Source: Vier Pfoten – Bulgaria

Dear friends,

As you know Animal Rescue Sofia has been working hard for years to create strong ties with the conscientious organizations working with stray animals in the country. The creating of an association uniting these organizations as a whole is an idea we have been developing since the summer of 2011. After a few meetings and discussions with colleagues we postponed the idea for 2012, but now it is obvious that the creating of such an Association is an emergency.

On the 11.05.2012 representatives of Animal Rescue Sofia, Vier Photen –Bulgaria and the German Spay/Neuter Centre joint forces and decided to establish the C.C. Association (the name will remain secret for now) – an organization to represent our common position before the authorities, media and public.

Without any underestimation to the hard works our colleagues in the country do – we decided it was best to start from Sofia. The reasons are strictly practical: we know each other well, we have worked together many times and we have proven we are people who can cooperate in a reasonable, well-organized way despite any personal differences. Last, but not least – the registration is easier when all the founding members are in one place.

Our goal is to unite the people who share the same principles and concepts:  adequate, sensible and most of all – professional. We hope that in time the Association will grow larger and include many organizations from all over the country – people whose work and experience we know and value, people whom we have great respect for. We believe that such an Association can become a really powerful instrument of influence in the hard times we are all facing as animal friends in Bulgaria.

We want to cordially thank the people who know our work, who trust us and count on us. It is your high opinion of us that gives us the strength and courage to fight despite the many difficulties. Our kindest regards to the colleagues who have worked and continue to work strenuously, adequately and in a civilized manner toward reaching our common goal!

We are posting this news somewhat in advance, because a message has reached us, published on Facebook by the “Grija i podslon za vseki” society from Ruse: that a national animal welfare NGO union should be created urgently.

We are flattered by the suggestion that representatives of Animal Rescue Sofia and Vier Pfoten – Bulgaria take part in the foundation of such a union. We greatly appreciate such a good evaluation of our efforts so far.

Nevertheless – even by simply reading the comments under this proposal we know very well that we don’t belong there.
This will not come as a surprise to the people who are involved in the animal welfare NGO’s intrigues, but for the ones who don’t, we need to say a few words:

There have been continuous and ongoing efforts to ruin our image – people who claim to be animal welfare activists spend their time insinuating about us – horrible lies that would have made us very rich if we had the time to take them to court. It is such a shame and waste of time – we have to defend ourselves against such “colleagues” who make more problems than any dog-hating government administration. We continue to be shocked by the ugly slander and outrageous insults we see about ourselves.

Sadly – we know too well: we are not at all welcome in this “group”. But fortunately we have made and keep up strong contacts with reputable organizations, we do have colleagues to go forward with.

The new Sofia program

After more than a years’ delay Sofia Municipal Council finally voted the new Program to control the stray dog population. As the program before it, this one is based on the Spay/Neuter&Return method. You can see the prematurely published text in Bulgarian HERE.

The program begins with an analysis on the current situation and alludes the problem to the lack of control over owned dogs, low registration numbers, dumping of animals and their pups and so on. It is quite funny that the analysis also says that NGO’s are to blame, because they are obstructing the work of the Municipal company Ecobalance.  Also, the analysis states the Ecobalance employees lack in numbers and expertise; there is no national dog registry; too few shelters; lack of coordination between the parties involved and so on. It even points out that a National Strategy is necessary to really address the problem.

The program states it aims at lowering the stray dogs number by -95% by the end of 2016. Sofia Municipality plans to achieve this by:

•           Working with private clinics for Spay/Neuter;
•           Providing Spay/Neuter materials to NGO Spay/Neuter centers;
•           Rising the numbers of dog-catching teams at Ecobalance;
•           Neutering owned animals along with the homeless;
•           Creating a local database for the dogs microchipped;
•           Euthanizing aggressive dogs and so on.

All those measures make a lot of sense, but can raise a lot of questions conserving the non-transparent work and lack of access for public control/

There is a point in the program itself that states Sofia Municipality will be suggesting changes in the Laws and legislation concerning the matter.

There is also a very disputable paragraph on the fact that a person or a company will not be allowed to adopt more than 2 animals.

Leaving aside the paragraphs specially included isolating the public sector – the program makes much sense. We are very glad that it finally includes spay/neuter of owned dogs. There are even some words suggesting that there will be educational and informational campaigns in schools and the media. The plan is to neuter dogs neighborhood by neighborhood, not like it is at the moment.

The only question is – after all said and done – do the civil servants have a will to solve the problem and most of all – do they understand the principles of the Spay/Neuter&Return method, suggested by the World Health Organization.

The absurdities continue

Meanwhile the parliamentary Committee  for Regional Self-Governance has accepted the absurd proposals for the change of the Animal Protection Act made by far-right nationalist party “Ataka” (in Bulgarian – HERE).  Their decision was based on a standpoint filed in by the Ministry of Agriculture and Foods. Unfortunately the Committee agreed on the following totally inadequate resolution:

•           Allowing people to destroy dogs in self-defense (?)
•           Dropping of the Spay/Neuter&Return method by deleting the text “and return” from the Animal Protection Act and collecting of all the animals in non-existent shelters (???)

This is extremely alarming, but fortunately the leading Committee is the Agricultural one. It lies ahead to see what the Authorities are planning (if at all) for yet another time.

See the statement by the Ministry of agriculture HERE (Bulgarian only).

Being stunned, it is still fair to say that the document was signed by a deputy-minister and bears the date of 19.04 – one day before the NGO’s protest and the meeting with the Prime Minister. Hopefully this is yet another insane inadvertence, because otherwise we will have to believe that we have been purposely being lied to for a whole month by authorities. All this is still to be cleared out. We will keep you informed.

In an interview for Presa daily the Minister of Agriculture Miroslav Naydenov states that he will take the legislative initiative to increase the tax or enforce obligatory Spay/Neuter for owned dogs.

Although this is put into practice in the entire civilized world it is a very unpopular measure here in Bulgaria as people consider castration to be a bad thing and do not know the benefits of it. Still, the suggested sanctions and control are an inseparable part solving the stray dog problem in Bulgaria.

Even the fact that finally we are talking about the true reason for having stray dogs is a small miracle. Up till now the stray dogs were considered to come from outer space, no connection was made between the dumping of dogs and the stray population.  The time has finally come to take new measures and stop the constant influx of unwanted dogs and puppies from people’s yards.

At the moment the Bogrov shelter where we operate is working mainly with dumped puppies. What we are worried about with things being put this way by the Minister is that the sanctions target pet owners mainly whilst the problem is most of all with dogs from suburban areas, gypsy neighborhoods, construction sites, factories and etc. around the city. We will try to make sure the authorities will focus on these groups (not only in Sofia – the problem is similar in the whole of Bulgaria).

Following are some of the things Minister Naydenov said for Presa (with reductions), most of them were discussed by the representatives of the Animal Wellfare NGO’s at the meeting with Prime minister Boyko Borisov in the presence of Minister Naydenov, the Mayor of Sofia Fandakova and her deputy Boyajiiska:

The idea is to have obligatory castrations for female dogs kept as pets. Only if it is of a value to it’s breed, of course.  We need to change the status quo which is: stray dogs don’t fall from the sky, they come from the total lack of control in the reproduction of pet and yard dogs.

The best would be to drastically increase the tax for un-spayed dogs, dogs which are not being bred from for cynological purposes.

It is ridiculous – no one knows how many dogs there are, because there is no statistic. And there is no statistic because the people who own dogs do not declare them in the municipality, nor pay their fees, no matter that they are obliged by law.

The control must be in the hands of the Municipalities, but they can’t go around people’s homes. They can check people in parks and fine them heavily – 500BGN (equivalent of 250E, the minimum wage in the country, trnsl), but we will catch only very few in this way. It is either a large tax or a large fine. They are basically the same measure anyway. Maybe we should encourage people to neuter their dogs by raising the tax for an unsprayed dog to 1000BGN (500E) instead of the 24BGN (12E) we have now.

And the neutered animals will be free of charge. This is one way we could motivate people. And if you have 1000BGN as a tax for an unsprayed dog – it will be a whole other story. We could go to that – not to have Spay/Neuter obligatory, but to enforce huge taxes for unsprayed dogs. Something like a “breeding tax”.

The other thing we are considering is that we need an Animal Police. A special municipal police unit where the officers will have the authority to enter the homes of people, check for animals and etc. We can’t expect the municipalities to start going round door-to-door, no municipality in Bulgaria has that sort of resources. And you know how people will react – they will be very mad about having their rights of privacy violated. So we should think abut these two opportunities: a large fine or a large tax.

Animal Rescue Sofia thanks the generous people who make our work possible.

We are a non-profit organization and our budget is based entirely on the ammount of trust and support we get from the public.

We wouldn’t be able to help the suffering animals if it wasn’t for your donations. It is through your generocity that lives are saved on a daily basis. You are our dogs’ and cats’ guardian angels.

See full list of sponsors for 2012

See sponsors in 2011, See sponsors in 2010

BECOME A SPONSOR OF ANIMAL RESCUE SOFIA

We want to specially thank everybody who has donated through our collection boxes! Everyone who’s bought our T-SHIRTS and other stuff – we really appreciate it! Everyone who’se brought food and goods to the shelter – THANK YOU for always being there for the dogs!
Please, have in mind that we have no way of keeping a record of your names, so if you have donated through this campaign you will not be able to find your name on the above list. Bless you for supporting our doggies (and kitties)!

April 2012 donors:

♥

Our special regards to the people who support us every month!

Thank you for your trust and persistence!