Re: Please read this response!! URGENT:DO NOT USE-KittyKind -CAT RESCUE-in Orange, NJ]

[Cherie A Gabbert]

Again I am sorry but, no excuse

Cherie

Mia Nicer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Ithe volunteers and fosters come when they have the time most dont get the chance to meet all the animals, most of them were not aware of how many animals were in her care. They work full-time and try to spend the free time they have when they are not with their familys helping these animals. Now realize they have their own plus the own at the off-site event and a ton everyday being dropped off by unresponsible owners or people with strays. Now Marlene lives in New Jersey a different state mind you and some have not even met her. They try to devote their time to the animals not chasing this woman down.

 

I understand someone should watch over he organization but that should be done within the higher ups in the organization or better yet an outside source making sure everything is done right. I agree with you on this but not people the who try to give the extra hour or 2 they have in the week helping a few animals try to find a good home. Its one thing to inquire and ask questions its another to be led to believe something else. Volunteering is a gift to these rescue groups by extradinary people -it is not their fulltime job. Try to take it easy on some of them.  

Cherie A Gabbert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Again, they should ask and shouls have been aware of what Kess was doing, if animals disappear from the shelter, you would inquire if they were adopted out or if she brought them home, then later ask about their and see if she needs any help...all things I myself have done and asked.

Mia Nicer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

But Joan The volunteers and fosters are not resposible for the animals that Kess takes home.

Joan Doljan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

I agree. Since most of us screen adopters, I think the same should be for fosterers. I pay attention when someone says a house smells, or their cats are always sick etc.  I never send anyone anywhere unless I have seen the house or facility, or someone I trust has.

 

Joan

Cherie A Gabbert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Mia,

We will agree to disagree on this.

 

I feel when you take on the responsiblity to foster or volunteer, you must take responsibility for your actions and that means if you were negligent in asking questions and being informed about the others in your facility then you are also to blame for the situation. Kess shoudl have known better, true, but the others should have watched and communicated with others, Kess is the President, but that does not mean she knows all and is right in everything she does. Personally I question everyone, and my vet questions me, to make sure I am not in it over my head (mind you she thinks I need a few more). This is the way organizations should be worked and run.

Cherie

 

 

 

Mia Nicer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Cherie,

 

I don't agree with what happened as I have said more than a few time with what Kess did.

 

I agree with what your saying as to maybe there should have been a system to have everyone looked at. I just don't feel that all volunteers and fosters should be responsible for this woman's actions. There should have been someone in charge of making sure the numbers were not to high and that the living conditions are in good shape but how can you assume it should be everyone's job. Rescue groups and shelters struggle to get volunteers especially fosters -to assume that they should also have to check or be responsible for someone else's living conditions is insane. Please realize Kess is the President and I think founder of Kitty Kind who knows what she told these people - it is also her responsiblity to show an example. It is not a fosters or volunteers responsibilty to make sure that everything is done right by her. Yes someone should have created a system maybe that can be a thing to follow but Kess also lives no where near most of these people nor should their shared time to help animals be used to babysit Kess.

 

We have different views to the ones who are suffering. lets just leave it at that. I am mad at Kess but I also have seen and heard volunteers and foster in pain over this and have opened my mind and tried to put myself in their situation. They might have assumed that someone was in knowledge of her conditions -how could you think these people would have just ignored this.

 

Mia  

Cherie A Gabbert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Mia,

When I have volunteered and fostered in the past I would go to other fosters homes and volunteers just to stop by and say hi, or visit the furr kids that I had cared for, the director would often be questioned by myself and others as to her population stand point and she would have us over to see for ourselves, not that she was untrusted but just as, she would come and see the volunteers set ups and check on the fosters, she opened her home to us so we could do the same, and any time....That is responsibilty.....what happened with Kess was complete irresposiblity on everyones part.

 

 Has anyone checked on your house, before you got started, so they new you were able to care for animals if need be....I bet they did and if they did not then shame on them....

 

I still have my vet come to my house and she is encouraging me to take more on, because of my house size and my views, but I KNOW when to stop, at least for a while until the kitten grow up.

 

 

Mia Nicer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Cherie,

 

The foster and volunteers are not ignorant. I understand you are mad at this woman but don't take it out on people that did not know -some are more upset than you. What if they were led to believe these animals were adopted or healthy and ok. Remember Kess has been doing this animal rescue thing for years- You would think she would know what the right thing to do was more than anyone. How do you know they didn't think they were ok or placed in great foster homes like their own. Please try to be a little more opened minded. I believe if they even had the smallest bit of evidence from her that something was wrong someone would have done something.

 

a lot of those volunteers are amazing kind animal lovers and would never let anything like this happen let alone turn their head like you are suggesting. They love helping animals -I know this because i know some of them. There are foster homes that are great!! not all are like the one you saw on tv.  

Mia
Cherie A Gabbert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Ignorance, is not an excuse the fosters and volunteers should have asked questions and inquired about the sick kitties would have been humane and kind hearted.

I hope the adoption rate goes up for the shelter and Kess gets what is coming to her...I am so enraged by this, sad for the animals but angry about the woman....

 

Animals and children look to us to help, care and protect them...and as usual we have failed, and this woman is to blame.

Cherie
Mia Nicer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

To everyone in this group,

 

Please do not take my recent email as a defense to Kitty Kind or this organization.

Again I am not affiliated with them and believe what her actions have created is horrible. My previous email is to express my concern for the cats with Kitty Kind and also the fosters and volunteers. Many of them are so upset and found out just like me and you. **Please remember some of those cats might have been with them at one point and they thought Marlene was doing the right thing. I am just worried some of these cats who really need homes will not get adopted because of the bad media Marlene has given this group.
Please remember that some of these cats are in foster homes and not with that woman!!

 

I hope I have not upset anyone with this email and have shed some light on the innocent kitties, fosters and volunteers. **Please remember they have just found out and just imagine how upset they must be.

 

Mia
Nina <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Mia,
I understand what you are saying about not judging everyone involved
with an organization because of one individual's actions and, of course,
the cats in their care shouldn't suffer further because of any human's
misconduct. When I read about this situation, I couldn't help but
wonder what sort of deplorable circumstances could lead someone who,
(one would hope), was trying to help, to these dire straights. Not
everyone will be able to muster compassion for the humans involved, but
we all are heartsick over what the innocents suffer.
Nina

Mia Nicer wrote:

> Hi everyone!! My name is Mia and I am a fellow rescuer in the New
> York, New Jersey and Conn. area. *I am not making an excuse for
> Marlene from Kitty Kind nor am I happy with the situation in which she
> has put the Kitty Kind organization but, I do know about and I am very
> familiar with this rescue group since it is in my area. I am not apart
> of this organization but please listen to what I have to say about it:*
> **
> *This situation is extremely horrible and very unfortunate but in the
> end it will be this rescue group and the kitties that suffer. Please
> do not make it any harder for these cats to get adopted. This group
> has lots of volunteers and fosters who put in all their free time to
> help some of these and their own cats and have nothing to do with this
> situation nor did they know anything about it. I believe that the
> overflow is what led Marlene to this situation, again I am not making
> an excuse for anyone but please do not punish the many volunteers,
> fosters and kitties for this. There are so many kitties in need of a
> home and by making it harder for them to get their cats adopted out
> doesn't help anyone.
>
> *
>
> */[EMAIL PROTECTED]/* wrote:
>
> DNA - Marlene Kess & Kitty Kind Rescue, East Orange, NJ.
> Hundreds of dead cats found in yard.
>
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: DO NOT USE-KittyKind -CAT RESCUE-in Orange, NJ
> Date: Fri, 20 May 2005 12:19:35 -0400
>
> Hundreds of dead cats found in woman's yard
> E. Orange resident operates rescue agency
> Friday, May 20, 2005
> BY BRIAN T. MURRAY AND KASI ADDISON
> Star-Ledger Staff
> Over two decades, Marlene Kess built a reputation in Manhattan as a
> caregiver of last resort for homeless and dying cats. If her
> rescue and
> adoption agency, KittyKind, couldn't place a sick animal, she took
> it home
> herself, overseeing its recuperation or caring for it until its death.
> Yesterday, authorities discovered what Kess' philosophy looked like in
> practice. Summoned to the woman's East Orange home by a neighbor
> complaining
> about a stench, city health inspectors found 48 cats inside the
> house -- 38
> of them in one room -- and more than 200 dead cats stuffed into
> garbage bags
> in the back yard.
> The sight of so many decomposing corpses -- and the fetid odor they
> produced -- sickened animal-welfare officers and others who
> responded to the
> two-story home on State Street.
> "Oh my God, it was awful," said Michael Fowler of the Associated
> Humane
> Societies, the state's largest shelter group. "The smell was
> horrible."
> Kess -- the 56-year-old founder and executive director of
> KittyKind, which
> operates one of New York City's few no-kill shelters -- moved to
> East Orange
> from Manhattan in July. Dozens of cats, apparently, moved with
> her. More
> arrived while she was there.
> "She claims that she takes in sick cats -- cats with feline
> leukemia -- and
> that she is a known rescuer who people will bring their cats to
> when they're
> dying," said Sgt. Joseph Bierman of the New Jersey Society for the
> Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
> When those cats did die, they went into large, heavy-duty garbage
> bags. Then
> they went into the yard, which backs to a parking lot used by the East
> Orange Board of Education and the East Orange Community Charter
> School.
> Bierman said he counted 21 garbage bags, each containing 10 or more
> vermin-infested carcasses. In some cases, he said, the cats had
> become so
> decomposed a precise number of bodies could not be determined.
> Kess had been
> placing dead cats in the yard since she moved in, Bierman said.
> "I haven't seen anything quite like this," Bierman said.
> "Certainly it's an
> unusual incident."
> Kess, seen arguing with animal-welfare officials outside the home,
> declined
> to comment.
> She was cited for several East Orange health code violations,
> among them
> keeping an unlawful number of animals, harboring dead animals and
> creating a
> potential environmental hazard by keeping the corpses on her
> property, city
> sanitary inspector Frank Habegger said last night.
> In addition, the SPCA charged her with 38 counts of failing to
> properly
> shelter cats. The counts stem from the cats being locked together
> in a front
> room. Some of the cats were healthy, while others were ill. Under
> state
> regulations, anyone keeping large numbers of animals must separate
> the sick
> from the healthy.
> Ten other healthy cats were roaming free in the house.
> Both investigations were continuing. This morning, public works
> crews were
> expected to remove the carcasses from the back yard, and
> necropsies were to
> be performed on some of the animals to determine a cause of death,
> said
> Darryl Jeffries, a city spokesman.
> Kess was allowed to keep the 48 living cats in her home because
> she said she
> would separate the sick and healthy animals, Bierman said. SPCA
> officers
> were planning to return to the home to ensure she does, he said.
> She apparently planned to bury the corpse-laden garbage bags in a
> large hole
> that had been recently dug in the back yard, Bierman said.
> "It was almost like a grave," he said, describing it as about 5
> feet deep
> and 7 feet wide. Kess told investigators she planned to plant a
> tree in the
> spot but hadn't yet gotten around to buying one, Bierman said. A
> handyman
> employed by Kess told investigators he dug the hole for a pool, the
> investigator said.
> Kess is well-known in cat rescue circles in Manhattan, where KittyKind
> operates a shelter within a Petco at Union Square. A longtime
> resident of
> Greenwich Village, she has been quoted frequently in small community
> newspapers about her efforts -- and struggles -- to care for cats that
> nobody else wants.
> "Animal overpopulation is a big problem," she told one community
> newspaper,
> the New York Resident, in 2002. "People are very irresponsible."
> Despite the difficulty placing cats, she has criticized New York
> City's high
> euthanasia rate, and she has championed the idea of seeing cats
> through even
> terminal illnesses.
> Not all animal-welfare advocates agree with that philosophy.
> "There are some things worse than death for animals, especially
> when they
> are sick and people are trying to needlessly extend their lives
> because they
> want to save every animal," said Roseanne Trezza, executive
> director of the
> Associated Humane Societies. "They refuse to recognize that we
> simply can't
> save them all, no matter how much we all care for these creatures,
> and no
> matter how much it hurts to euthanize them."
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>
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Mia Nicer

Phone: (646) 226-3277

Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

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Have a purrfect day

Cherie

 

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Mia Nicer

Phone: (646) 226-3277

Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

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Do You Yahoo!?
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Have a purrfect day

Cherie

 

---

Do You Yahoo!?
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Have a purrfect day

Cherie

 

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Cherie