PETA president barks up wrong tree; Vorous’s local plea for dogs on point

Methinks Ingrid Newkirk, president and co-founder of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, was barking up the wrong tree in the Washington Post on the eve of the Westminster Kennel Club dog show at Madison Square Garden in New York.

“Dogs deserve better than this outdated beauty pageant, which is why we should refuse to watch it,” she said in an editorial page diatribe against this century-old show, and dog shows in general.

These adoptable cuties were present at one of the Memorial Day-Dogs of War events hosted by the author in Front Royal. They and ALL their Canine brothers and sisters deserve legal protections from neglect and abuse – and if the state legislature won’t man up to do it, hopefully our Town and County representatives will. Photos/Roger Bianchini

But a far better mission was being talked and written about in the local media involving Carol Vorous, a Front Royal woman who was urging local laws be written to protect pets in Warren County from winter’s winds, rain, snow and bitter cold temperatures. In other words, her priorities were in the right place.

As a dog lover and participant in animal welfare, including dog and horse rescue, all my adult life – yes, I’ve had my problems with indiscriminate breeding both nationally and locally, particularly with pet owners in our neighborhoods who, in Vorous’s words, own dogs that they treat “pretty much as lawn ornaments.”

These are the dogs who urgently need protective ordinances and the media time and space that would help bring them about.  Fighting to get the 141-year-old Westminster dog show abolished is, in my opinion, a fight that cannot be won, and, also in my opinion, would deprive some 3,000 competitors a doggone good time.

Also in the “Post”, on Feb. 17, a reporter/dog lover, Karin Brulliard, wrote she grew up with Siberian huskies and was assigned to her first-ever dog show by the Post.  She saw no particular problem with Westminster, although her priorities, too, were with “homeless dogs who would love to snack on” the treats offered the show dogs.

Back to Vorous, my colleague Roger Bianchini reported on her representations to the Warren County Board of Supervisors last week, as did other print media. Reading between all the lines, I hope the BOS – and, hopefully, the Town of Front Royal – will give her proposals a more than cursory look.

For example, County Attorney Dan Witten opined that, in regard to extreme cold weather, “it’s extremely hard to write an ordinance that encompasses all (the) different breeds.”

C’mon Dan! You’re an attorney.  You can, if you set your mind to it, write a law that would cover a herd of elephants.  So lets get a draft to the board, and get with town attorney Doug Napier to agree on wording that will give ALL our dogs the protection and shelter some of them need.  And throw in hot weather, too – That’s just as dangerous to animals left chained outdoors all their lives.

My kudos to Carol Vorous.  I remember three years ago at the dog park when she first floated her “All Dogs Matter” community outreach program. Since then, she has seen some pretty horrible sights in neighborhood yards and has acted on what she witnessed.

A German Shepherd rescue is in the shade at one of the author’s Memorial “Dog Day” events , and out of the late-spring sun – maybe we can bring all the county’s dogs in – and out of the hot and cold aura of neglect.

And she’s seen what I’ve recently come across in our Rockland neighborhood – too many dogs that are, A/ left outside in all weathers – summer heat and winter cold – without appropriate shelter and B/ dogs that receive little or no companionship with their owners, usually “outside” dogs which are often tethered on legal but cruel lengths of rope or chain.

As Carol Vorous would describe these unfortunate animals: “Just lawn ornaments.”

(Malcolm Barr, Sr. is a former president of the Warren County Humane Society, a founder of JCCARE, a national rescue group dedicated to a breed called the Japanese Chin, and an honorary member of the Japanese Chin Club of America. His family includes the pug, Ophelia, and the Siberian husky, Pola, both rescue dogs. He is a contributing writer for the Royal Examiner.)