Who you gonna call?
After posting my report last week on the failure of the city staff to even mention the need for a new animal shelter, a number of folks asked who they should contact to express their concern over the absence of any mention of the animal shelter in the city’s presentations and the “F” grade that the building got. After doing some further investigation, I have determined that there is no easy way to add the shelter as a priority to the city survey except as a comment at the end of the survey. I don’t think this will do the job.
So I am asking everyone who is concerned about the future of the shelter to email Erin Smith, who is the head of the public works department. Her email address is [email protected] or you can call her at 510-747-7930. The City needs to know that the shelter is a vitally important part of our community and deserves to have funds from the proposed bond measure allocated and restricted. Unless the funds are restricted in the language of the bond measure, there is no obligation to spend any of the bond money on the shelter.
The City’s fact sheet says, “Alameda’s high quality of life depends on infrastructure that works.” It is clear that the current building is not working based on the failing grade it received, and while the survey doesn’t even mention the animal shelter building, it did ask how important it is to “ensure trees are well maintained along city streets and in parks.” So, all of us animals are considered less important than the street trees??? For updated information on the shelter and bond measure be sure to read my Sunday reports…