SPCA donation boxes targeted

Thieves are targeting Napier SPCA's donation boxes which have been placed on counters at businesses in the city.

The latest theft took place at the Tucker Box lunch bar in Thames St, Pandora, about 3.30pm on Thursday, with images captured on CCTV picturing a stocky young male dressed in green T-shirt and shorts, sporting a green cap with a tan peak, and striding out of the shop with the locked clear plastic collection box in hand.

SPCA manager Bruce Wills said two young males had first entered the shop and bought some food. They then "milled around" outside and were seen looking through the windows into the shop, apparently waiting until no staff were at the counter. It was then the theft took place, and the pair, one with a backpack, rode off on bicycles.

Mr Wills' distress was obvious last night when he said: "I don't mind being quoted calling him a scumbag."

But it wasn't the only theft lately, with an audit this week showing two other boxes had vanished from a Napier bar - assumed by staff to have been collected by the SPCA - and there appeared to have been incidents in which bogus collectors had gone to shops claiming to be SPCA representatives collecting the donations, Mr Wills said.

The donations are vital to the viability of the SPCA work, but the organisation now has to review how the boxes are secured and emptied, and what alternatives there are in an "unbelievably" competitive charitable funding market. "We've got dozens of these boxes out," Mr Wills said. "Fundraising is an incredibly important part of what we do. We wouldn't survive without it. We have to scrape around for every cent. To lose it to some thief is heartbreaking."

The SPCA doesn't get any government funding, lotteries grants or help from head office, meaning it is entirely supported by fundraising efforts involving the community.

"We have a team of volunteers constantly scratching their heads for ideas, but, at the end of the day, we don't have enough to cover our costs."

The theft was reported to police and Mr Wills is hoping those who took the money can be identified and the donations and the donation box returned. It was probable the box had been "smashed into a million pieces," but possible someone else had seen it, he said. It's not the first time that a donation box has been targeted.

Last September a Dannevirke Daffodil Day co-ordinator was shocked when a "low life" took the donation box from the Four Square on High St.

"It annoys me to think we run around trying to raise money to help those with cancer and someone goes and does this," volunteer Sandra Haycock said at the time.