BY: Keith S. Shikowitz, Investigative Reporter
This part of the story is going to focus on conditions at the shelter which were a major factor in the decision by Rockland Green administration to terminate the contract with Hi Tor Animal Care Inc.
One of the accusations Rockland Green made was that there was a Failure to keep the animal shelter premises neat, orderly and in accordance with best management practices
. Gary Kogut responded to this allegation as we saw in part 1 of this series of stories, “We have video of that shelter. Anyone can look at it at any time to take a look to see that that shelter was as neat and orderly as it possibly could be.”
The problem with his statement about the neatness of the facility was that the next videos are from the former Hi Tor facility taken on September 21, 2023, and contradict those claims made by Gary Kogut.
A letter from Barbara Carr, Shelter Standards Consultant, Libby Post Executive Director further contradicted Gary Kogut’s statement about the conditions at the shelter. The information in this letter to Rockland Green came as a result of a tour Carr took at the Former Hi Tor Animal Shelter.
First: “The executive director toured us around the property through several cat housing units. Some were in containers, others in sheds. In some the odor of cat urine was quite high and in others the air seemed quite clean. Cats were housed in a variety of cages, different sizes, and different materials. None of the cages would pass the inspection under the new law. We visited one free roaming container that housed a dozen or so cats. The unit was very dark and inhospitable. The cats were extremely stressed in this container.”
Second: “The next stop was to be going into the kennel area, but the ED did not want to go in without a kennel attendant. He was questioned why and eventually agreed that there were several dogs so dangerous inside that he wanted an attendant in case one was to get loose. We decided we should not go into the kennel.
The ED told us of one dog that had recently bitten two staff members so badly they had to go to the hospital. He said that two veterinarians and he had recommended euthanasia for this dangerous dog, but the board would not allow it. Apparently, there are several dogs that are living their lives out at this completely inadequate facility because their behavior is such that they are a threat to humans.”
Around the property there were outdoor play yards for dogs and individual makeshift kennels for the dogs to occupy during the day so they would get fresh air and sunlight. When asked how they were cleaned the answer was not satisfactory, as basically they cannot be disinfected properly due to a lack of water and drainage at the facility.
• Hi Tor in its entirety is an unacceptable shelter to house companion animal
• The linens stored outside, with cats lying on them, and then being used as bedding for caged cats is a recipe for medical disaster. The linens are not washed prior to being used so any fomites, bacteria, virus, or parasites deposited on them by the feral cats sleeping on them or any wild animal that goes into the container will be directly exposing the resident cats who are housed on these linens. While there are no animals with ringworm at the facility currently, it is just a matter of time until it presents itself again.
• The tour of the facility was well after noon and many of the animals housing units were not yet cleaned. Presumably this means that they are either fed in a dirty cage or are not yet fed. Either is unacceptable.
• Allowing unvaccinated and unsterilized cats to wander the property is not only unacceptable, it is ethically horrifying at an organization that has struggled with overpopulation and disease for its entire history.
• The Board of RG Cares should be made aware of the fact that dangerous dogs are being warehoused at the Former Hi Tor facility due to a very uninformed No-Kill policy.
Hi Tor, is the worst example of animal sheltering that the consultants have ever seen. It appears to be like visiting a large cruelty case in process. It was a very wise move for Rockland County to make plans to eradicate the current organization and practices and establish a new state-of -the-art shelter with state-of-the-art practices.
This report was backed up by another independent evaluation of the Former Hi Tor facility from Ashley Gardenier from Southern Paws Inc.
Gardenier stated “What I can tell you from my own personal experience coming from someone who has worked in shelters all over the country. I’ve worked in shelters in Louisiana, Mississippi, West Virginia, and Kentucky. I’ve worked in shelters in the Northeast. What I can tell you is I have never seen a shelter that was this bad in the Northeast. That was this dirty, this irresponsible with their medical records, vaccinations and keeping the animals healthy. The only place I have seen this is in the South.”
Additionally, she said that there was no disease control protocols. Everything was filthy. There were literally maggots and things like that. Everybody can turn around and say they didn’t have enough people. They didn’t have this; they didn’t have that but what I will say is that if I didn’t have that I would be in here at midnight ripping cage banks apart trying to get this place clean.
I stated that I’ve been in there a number of times getting pets from there, bringing pets back to there. Animals that we found and stuff. It might have been before these people took over, but it was always clean when I went in there. I don’t know what happened recently.
“This was long neglect. Just the smell. Just the smell in here. It was disgusting.” She said.
Gary Kogut had stated the shelter was clean and neat. The question now is “How long do you think this was like this based on your expertise?”
Gardenier couldn’t give an exact timeframe, but she said that it’s been a long time. “This didn’t happen in a month. If they’re not taking care of it, it can happen in a year. If it’s long term and you’re not taking care of it you’re going to see the same thing. I would say it’s been a very long time based on the fact that they had the feline panleukopenia outbreak.”
Pictures taken at the shelter after the termination of the contract also contradict Kogut’s statements about the neatness of the facility inside and outside.
These conditions included how the pets’ toys were taken care of.
Videos taken by Rockland Green and Four Legs Good show the conditions were not what Kogut was saying they were.
The conditions were so bad, one worker was gagging when she saw maggots and other filth under some of the cages.
Phillips concurred with what the pictures and videos showed about the conditions at the shelter and explained what actions Rockland Green took after taking over.
Kogut claimed that the physical plant was their (Rockland Green’s) responsibility. To make sure that nothing could get in to hurt the animals.
“In a sense that the facility does not meet code or the regulations of the state of NY, that’s a problem. But Rockland Green was working with the same facility that we were. The fact of the matter is that if that facility is not up to snuff for animal health, it’s beyond Hi Tor, my organization, to deal with it.
Kogut claimed that Rockland Green was responsible for seeing that the facility was up to snuff. “To the best of anybody’s ability given the fact that it’s 70 years old or however old it is. I’m going to cut slack there. It is what it is. But the idea to in a sense that, pointing the finger at Hi Tor for having a facility that was not… Properly maintained. Up to snuff. As clean as it needed to be, you know we’re down there to take care of the animals. Their role in that contract was to maintain the facility. Very deliberately said. Explicitly written in that way.
In Schedule A, Contractor Obligations, section 5 states: ‘ Such shelter or pound shall be operated at the Animal Shelter Premises provided by Rockland Green, in the Village of Pomona, in the Town of Ramapo, Rockland County, New York. The Animal Shelter Premises shall be maintained in a sanitary manner and in accordance with Applicable Law and Best Management Practices.’
Jerry Damiani said that Rockland Green’s responsibility on this was to maintain the physical plant of the shelter. If repairs were needed, they were responsible for taking care of that. The basic day-to-day upkeep of the facility was the responsibility of Hi Tor.
People would say that part of maintaining the health and safety of the animals was keeping the facility in good, neat shape. To which Kogut agreed. Additionally, people would then say well, it’s the people that are there day to day, their responsibility to make sure that you don’t have feces laying around all over the place. All kinds of garbage and other things laying around that could create an issue.
Kogut emphatically stated, “None of that, there was nothing in what Hi Tor was about in anyway of what you just described. The pens were clean. The animals were cared for. None of them were dirty. They always had fresh water, clean food. Their kennels were cleaned DAILY. If not more than once if the animal was ill. The staff was all over that. All over it.”
“So, you’re saying that the staff did maintain the facility, clean and neat.” Kogut’s response was, “Completely. I can say that without equivocation. Absolutely.”
Phillips and the videos and pictures taken at the facility during the week after Hi Tor left contradict Kogut’s assertion. “That is so far from the truth. Some of those cages that the cats were in you can tell they weren’t cleaned in MONTHS. Literally months. As a matter of fact, when Four Legs Good took over the first thing they started doing, they started cleaning them. The dog pens were just disgusting. They had feces when they took them over. It looked terrible.”
According to Phillips another problem with Hi Tor was the Failure to provide policies and procedures following at least NINE requests from Rockland Greens. We’ve been requesting from them all different types of procedures and policies on all different aspects of operating the shelter. Nine times we had to request it.
Rockland Green has records of the correspondence and requests, but just like Kogut’s claim that he could not release his video of the neat and clean conditions he claims existed at the shelter when they left, because of the pending legal actions, Rockland Green has stated the same thing about those records.
Kogut claimed to have no record of any of those requests. Zero. “It’s news to me. It’s news to the entire board. We have never seen anything from them asking for policies and procedures. I’ll also say that the way the contract was written, Rockland Green delegated the running of that shelter to Hi Tor. We were never obligated to provide any of that documentation to Rockland Green. Period. It wasn’t even part of the contract that they would have oversight of those policies and procedures. We have no written record, phone record, email anything where they requested that from us.”
The problem with Kogut’s statement is that under the Terms section of the contract subsection 5 Record Keeping and Auditing it clearly states: The CONTRACTOR shall maintain and provide to ROCKLAND GREEN on reasonable notice (but not more than fifteen (15) days), and to any Governmental Body having monitoring or review authority, access to and the right to examine all records and documents necessary to determine compliance with Applicable Law and the terms of this Agreement.
The investigation into the happenings at the animal shelter under the management of Hi Tor Animal Care Inc is ongoing.