Last night at midnight a fire broke out at the Berkeley East Bay Humane Society, apparently in the laundry area, but it quickly spread to the area where cats are kept - in cages - and before the alarm was sounded - by a pitbull owned by a tenant in the building and who is today's hero - 12 cats had died. We can only hope they died of smoke inhalation before the flames reached them. Some fast acting by Fire Department staff, shelter volunteers and others saved all the dogs at the facility and some other cats.
There was no adequate alarm system or sprinkler system in the area where the fire broke out.
How ironic that today is the site dedication of the new Berkeley city animal shelter (a completely different facility for the many of you who do not know the difference between Humane Societies, SPCA's and municipal animal shelters). A new animal shelter being built over my strongest objections and over my ten years of fighting for the best in a new facility rather than the 'just get it built' mentality which has driven our elected officials and city staff to move this project forward in spite of huge red flags about public and animal safety at the new site.
But then, I have tilted at windmills as a lifestyle choice for most of my 5 decades....
For 8 years, since I led the bond Measure to victory that raised $7.2 million for a new city shelter I have urged the city and the Humane Society to build a new joint facility. The Humane owns an entire city block but has no money to upgrade it's crumbling facility, and the City had the money but no site to build on. The City just did not have the desire - led by a Mayor who doesn't give a toss about animals and a City Council that cared far less than it should. The scandal is the failure of the City of Berkeley and the board of the Berkeley East Bay Humane Society to get a deal done when they had an opportunity to do so in 2004 and that is the backdrop to this awful tragedy. Yes, fires can break out in any building, but this facility was a fire waiting to happen, and there were a ton of fingers crossed through the years that nothing terrible happened. And today, as all the dogs from the Humane have been transferred to the equally decrepit current Berkeley Shelter building, one can just hope this isn't the moment when an animal hoarder gets busted and 20 dogs need shelter...
Because for all the talk of emergency plans - the only reason the dogs could even be taken to the animal shelter is because right now the shelter had open kennels - partly because there have been a higher number of euthanasias of dangerous dogs, partly because rescue groups (including the Humane) have taken an increasing number of dogs from the shelter (funny to see some of those 'rescued' dogs come back to the BACS shelter) and because adoption rates have been high. But in the 'new' facility there will be 12 fewer dog kennels than in our current facility.
The city is so sick of me and so sick of my complaining about this that they will not, even now, take a harder look at what they are doing.
If a fire breaks out at the front of our new building (which by the way is costing $5 million more than budgeted for), the Fire Department will stand hopelessly by without being able to acess the back of the building. When a bad earthquake causes the University overpass to weaken, there will be no way of saving animals as the concrete smashes down on the animal shelter built just feet away, if a couple of homeless people start a fire to keep warm at the back of the building there will be no saving the animals on that side of the building.
Political machinations, backroom deals, the lack of commitment on City Council to building the best and not just the new - and the lack of public process - all of that could be brought to light in the illuminating flames of a small fire and the charred bodies of cats trying desperately to force their way out of locked cages. But the light will be extinguished in the torrent of political expediency as surely as if the torrent were from a Fire Department water cannon.
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