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Veronica Ferguson
By DEREK MOORE
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Sonoma County supervisors on Tuesday delayed deciding what do about the Animal Care and Control Department in the wake of a controversial firing, but they balked at hiring a consultant to help with that analysis.
County Administrator Veronica Ferguson had asked supervisors for 60 days and the authority to hire a consultant as she weighs whether animal care should be separated from the Agricultural Commissioner’s Office.
That became a possibility after Ag Commissioner Cathy Neville decided to fire Amy Cooper on July 12, 48 hours before the former animal care director was to become a permanent county employee.
Supervisors on Tuesday instead gave Ferguson about a month to come back to them with a recommendation, and urged her to do the analysis in-house rather than spend money for an outside consultant.
“There’s a definite angst in the community that we are not moving quickly enough to address these concerns,” said Supervisor Efren Carrillo. He acknowledged some “obvious issues pertaining to personnel issues” but said that he would not discuss them.
Several speakers on Tuesday criticized supervisors for not addressing those concerns, and specifically, the widespread calls for Cooper to be re-instated.
“There was a terrible wrong done to the department and it needs to be addressed,” Myma Spiegler said.
Added shelter volunteer Robin Johnson: “Let’s not fix what wasn’t broken. Please don’t waste taxpayer dollars on a consultant. We already have found the right person for the job, and that’s Amy Cooper.”
Neither Neville nor other county officials have publicly stated the reasons the ag commissioner fired Cooper, citing personnel rules as barriers to that disclosure.
But comments that Neville made during Tuesday’s meeting were interpreted by some animal care employees and managers as criticism of Cooper.
Asked by a supervisor if she supports the county’s analysis of the animal care department, Neville answered by saying that “everybody needs to keep in mind” that the shelter is supposed to serve animals from within Sonoma County, and not those from outside the area.
“I can’t stress that enough,” she said.
Neville declined to say after the meeting whether her comments amounted to criticism of Cooper. “I’m not talking about Amy Cooper,” she said.
She did say that she would not interpret moving animal care from her department as a sign of disagreement with her decision to fire Cooper.
“Not at all,” she said. “I don’t think it has anything to do with that. I think it’s time to look at the proper placement for animal care.”
Several animal control employees said the intended target of Neville’s remarks during Tuesday’s meeting was clear to them.
“I took it as a slam against Amy Cooper,” said Jeff Clemens, a supervising animal control officer who watched the proceedings on TV. “It was such a pathetic, cheap shot, and it had no validity.”
In October, about three months into her tenure, Cooper approved taking in 25 dogs from Monterey County’s animal shelter to help ease crowded conditions there.
Six dogs were brought to Sonoma County from Monterey in December, followed by another transfer in February. Shelter staff did not have those numbers available Tuesday.
Shelter supervisor Cathy Fenn said all of the dogs were adopted, save for two that had to be destroyed because of illness.
She said R.J. Kamprath, a vocal shelter critic, raised questions about the transfers, including that other dogs allegedly were destroyed to make room for the Monterey animals and that the adoptions skewed the shelter’s data on euthanasia rates.
But Fenn said the shelter had space for the transferred dogs. She said the dogs could have been logged separately from in-county animals so as not to alter the data but she did not know Tuesday if that had occurred.
“A lot of people thought we brought them in to make money. Adoptions don’t make us money,” Fenn said. “We just thought it was a way of helping another agency that was overflowing with dogs.”
Whatever the case, the transfers were not a secret, and were written about in the February edition of Paw Prints, the shelter’s monthly newsletter.
Clemens said the practice fulfilled one of the missions that Neville had outlined for Cooper, which was to collaborate with other animal welfare agencies.
“Sonoma County has always been willing to help out other shelters,” Clemens said. “If we had room, we would help offset shelters that were bursting at the seams. And if we had a surplus of cats or dogs, other shelters would reciprocate. It was a win-win.”
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I agree with Baseball? San Diego County would know about her lack of leadership skills. Maybe that’s why they didn’t promote her to Ag Commissioner? What a cowardly thing to do…fire someone 2 days before becoming permanent without as much as an explanation. She obviously had some problem with Amy and it wasn’t professional. Maybe she learned that in San Diego.
I wonder if Neville’s joyride this weekend will do anything to sway the koolaid drinkers?
Amy Cooper/Animal Care and Control Supporters needed. Tuesday, 8/24/10 to speak at 2pm at the Board of Supervisors chambers. Lets not let this go away until a decision is made. Please come and show your support to bring Amy Cooper back and to make Animal Care and Control its own department!
Nice Pitch BASEBALL!
Thats exactly the problem, Cathy Neville is way out in left field. As long as were using sports terminology…..The head coach needs to be fired and let’s get on with the game!The players in the AG and ACC deserve better! Especilly their fan base,,,WE THE TAX PAYERS!
First, thank you Derek Moore for your excellent and continued reporting. It’s clear the Board of Supervisors is going to stand-by their department head. Fine, keep Cathy Neville. But why don’t they realize that they can also support Amy Cooper, the ACC staff and the many, many people who have come out in support of Amy Cooper? Unfortunately Cathy Neville isn’t smart enough to realize that she should do the right thing and rehire Amy Cooper. So, it’s up to the Board of Supervisors to put this issue to rest, move ACC and rehire Amy.
Dogs don’t pay taxes….the idea that we should only shelter “Sonoma County” dogs is ludicrous. We have an animal shelter because as a society we’ve made the decision that it is better to fund a shelter than to euthanize animals; not because the animals have paid into the system and are entitled to the service.
Shouldn’t we be encouraging this kind of cooperation?
What was Cathy Neville doing way out in left field? Did she not understand Shirley Zane’s question in the Board of Sups meeting? Her answer, that had nothing to do with the items on the agenda, reflects her professionalism and her relationship with R.J. Kamprath. Neville had to be redirected to answer Zane’s question. This is who we pay $160,000/yr to run 3 of Sonoma County’s departments? Has Veronica Ferguson or the Board of Sups checked with her subordinates in San Diego to find out what they thought of Ms. Neville? Where has the otherwise vocal R.J. been during all this, has Neville told her counterpart that she should stay low for now? What do the employees in the Ag office think of Neville? Lots of unanswered questions the Board and the CAO should consider investigating.
According to shelter staff and the shelter veterinarian, the shelter was nearly empty when they decided to help out Monterey. They took in highly adoptable dogs that would have otherwise been euthanized, no Sonoma County shelter animals were euthanized because of it. They should be commended on lowing the dog population so much that they were able to assist an overflowing shelter.
Other shelters and rescue groups, from outside Sonoma County, take animals from Sonoma County Animal Shelter on a regular basis. So it’s OK for us to send animals to other counties but it’s not ok for them to send them to us? Have you ever heard I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine?
Plenty of people come from outside Sonoma County to adopt from one of our shelters, should there be a stop to that?
Animal shelters help each other out, if you spent time at any of our local shelters you would find that out first hand. Quit complaining and start volunteering or donate some despirately needed funds.
SONOMA Animal Care and Control, not Monterey, nor any other County. We don’t need to be taking in animals from out of county when we have our own issues here. Amy Cooper had no business adding to our already over crowded shelter. And Jeff Clemens needs to quit balking at every little thing and taking it personally. Get back to work, Jeff.
Sounds like the new CAO’s honeymoon is over.
Cathy Neville, you are a walking,talking contradiction! First you instruct ACC to reduce the euthanaisa rates at the shelter, Develope collaboration and then in the same breath critisize them for doing so! I recently visited the animal shelter and saw that they have very high numbers of animals there. I suspect that this is a normal cycle and trend for all shelters. If Sonoma County Animal Shelter is prohibited from assiting other shelters, does this mean that other shelters won’t be able to help Sonoma County? ( as stated by your own words!) It would appear that YOU are the cause for having these helpless animals unnecessarily euthanized as you have given no other alternative to SCACC. You should be ashamed of yourelf and your comment! Do the right thing! Retract your decision of firing Amy Cooper, Ask for her immediate reinsatement, support that ACC be STAND ALONE! RESIGN and provide an apology to the Animals and the People of Sonoma County!