Tears and walkouts as SPCA meets with CHB community

Enclosures sit empty at Waipukurau's SPCA Shelter.

Voices were raised and tears shed at a public meeting last week, as an audience of about 50 Central Hawke's Bay (CHB) community members challenged SPCA New Zealand's decision to close the local SPCA Shelter.

The meeting was held in Waipukurau last Wednesday, with SPCA NZ area manager Bruce Wills and NZ SPCA general manager operations Sue Kinsella speaking to a crowd largely made up of CHB SPCA supporters and volunteers.

Answering an audience question: "What can we do to change the SPCA's mind?", Kinsella said "The decision has already been made".

Two supporters rose and walked out, one shouting that he was obviously wasting his time. Others walked out throughout the emotionally charged meeting, while Mayor Alex Walker stepped up to call for calm.

"I understand there's a lot of passion in the room, but our energy needs to be spent on trying to understand how the new system will work," Walker said.

Wills told the meeting that "when your SPCA centre was working well, it was great" but said often the smaller shelters were not working well, with a quarter of SPCA centres insolvent when they were amalgamated into SPCA NZ in 2017.

"Animal care costs have spiralled and smaller centres cost more - almost double - because of the numbers of animals. Since 2017 SPCA NZ has improved on every metric," Wills said.

"Euthanasia rates have halved and lengths of stay have dropped dramatically."

The CHB SPCA Shelter in Coughlan Road was temporarily closed earlier this year, with Wills announcing it was due to a lack of suitable applicants for the job of centre manager.

Last month the closure was announced as permanent.

Longtime shelter volunteer Jayne Sparr spoke at the meeting, saying the shelter didn't need paid staff.

"You can run it with volunteers, we did for years. You don't need all these paid people. We can look after the animals and do it well but you just won't let us. We've been pushed aside," Sparr said.

Founder member and longtime committee member Chris Whateley said he did not understand why the facility was insolvent, saying "in the last financial report before I resigned in 2017 the balance was well in the black", while Kinsellar told the meeting the shelter "was costing twice what it brought in".

Wills explained that animal care takes priority over "bricks and mortar", saying the SPCA now has an arrangement with longtime CHB SPCA supporters Vet Services for animals to be accepted, treated, then transported to larger centres, where there is a greater chance they will be adopted.

"This will be at least as good if not better than we had before. It's working well for us in other places. We are also employing a field officer who can collect animals and take them to the clinic."

Former SPCA volunteer Gaye Campbell said she raised the issue of permanent closure in February but was assured the closure was temporary.

"We have volunteers who have been here for 20 years and have awards for their service, but we've been kept in the dark. The Waipukurau shelter has beautiful spacious grounds, yet they close us down and keep a grotty little centre in Napier, just 15km from the Hastings SPCA," Campbell said.

Kinsella said there was never an intention to do things by subterfuge and stealth. "I apologise if that's how it's been perceived."

Mayor Walker closed the meeting, saying: "for more than 30 years there have been people in our community who have been the faces and voices of animal welfare. Coming from outside our community and making these changes - we feel our voices get taken away. Yes the service will be good but we're still struggling to see who will be those faces and voices now."

Kinsella said there has been no discussion about the future of the Coughlan Road property.

Mayor Walker asked that the community be included in that discussion.