A couple Harford County residents had questions about funding for the Humane Society of Harford County during the County Council's first of two public hearings on the FY 2016 budget, while two others championed continued financial support of the library system.
The hearing at Joppatowne High School was attended by about a dozen people, five of whom spoke.
Harford County Executive Barry Glassman has proposed a $642.5 million operating budget and an $89.6 million capital budget for the 2016 fiscal year starting July 1. Property tax rates and the local income tax rate will not change.
Dale Thomas, of Joppa, told the council he is concerned there is no transparency with the funding to the Humane Society, a private organization that receives considerable funding from the county.
Construction and furnishing of the society's new $7 million animal shelter in Fallston is being funded by the county, which uses the shelter as its dog pound. In addition, the proposed county operating budget for FY 2016 has a $750,000 appropriation toward humane society operations, same as the current budget.
Thomas said he provides microchips and other animal services to the community on his own and said his team will continue providing a better job than what the Humane Society has been able to provide.
Thomas and another speaker, Adam Wysocki, wondered about how the Humane Society's money is being spent. Wysocki is a founder of No Kill Harford, a non-profit that works to save every adoptable animal.
Wysocki told the council he is not sure whether there should be more funding for the society or whether existing spending is adequate, because the use of the money is just not being seen with any transparency by the public.
"We have made a formal request. We have been denied every time," he said.
He added he did not know how the Harford Humane Society's funding compared with that of others in the state. Wysocki also said animal welfare in the county is "a lot bigger than just the Humane Society."
Wysocki also spoke two days earlier at the council's May 5 public hearing on legislation that will revamp the county's entire animal control operation, transferring it from the Department of Licenses, Permits and Inspections to the Sheriff's Office.
During that hearing, he also expressed his concerns that there be more transparency about the Humane Society's record keeping and that it be available to the public.
He also suggested that detailed records on animals that are surrendered or abandoned be posted on the Sheriff's Office website monthly.
Jean Salvatore, of Bel Air, who also spoke at the May 5 hearing on the animial control legislation, said she is concerned decisions about euthanizing abandoned animals or those deemed to be dangerous will still rest with the director of the Humane Society or the Sheriff's Office and not strictly with a licensed veterinarian. He said only a veterinarian should make that decision.
The pending animal control legislation could be approved by the Harford County Council as early as Tuesday night's legislative session; however, there are some additional amendments to decriminalize penalties for pet owners who don't get the required county license by making such violations a civil penalty. Those amendments were not acted upon at the May 5 council meeting but were on the agenda for Tuesday night's session.
The Harford Humane Society's board of directors has a county government member listed on the society's website as Andrew Tress, an aide to county Director of Administration Billy Boniface.
Both the society's board and leadership have undergone changes in the past year. Pete Hicks is listed as chairman of the board and last month, the board announced that Mary Leavens had stepped down as executive director after seven years and the search was beginning for her replacement.
As an animal advocate, the lack of access to animal control data makes it impossible for the community to know if the $750,000 budgeted to the Humane Society was "not enough, too much or just right," Wysocki wrote in an email Tuesday. "Ideally, Harford residents would be able to look at intake data, calculate a cost per animal to the county and then look at return to owner data, adoption data and humane euthanasia data and compare those numbers to other counties in the state … but that's just not possible now, even though the County Code requires that detailed and accurate records be kept of intake and disposition. Formal and informal requests for these records have been denied for years."
He did say, however, that he had a conversation with Council President Richard Slutzky, "who told me that the County Council and the County administration agree that the records should be publicly available and that they were working on language to make that happen."
Library support
Joanne Velez, who said she is a long-time resident of Joppa and Rumsey Island, told the council she hopes the county government will continue supporting libraries.
"Our library has been our only community center," she said.
Greg Fox, another local resident, also spoke up for the library, saying he has lived in places such as suburban Los Angeles and believes Harford County libraries are better by far.
Fox said he has grandchildren who are home-schooled and the library provides a major resource for them.
The county's proposed funding for the library system in the next operating budget is $16,279,546, which is an increase of $142,357, mainly to cover a merit raise for the system's employees, according to county budget documents.
The county also funds the renovation of existing library facilities and construction of new ones. The 2016 capital budget does not include new funding; however, prior funding includes almost $19.7 million – $7.7 million for the new Havre de Grace Library under construction and $4.2 million for the completed expansion of the Whiteford library.
The second Harford County Council hearing on the budget will be held Wednesday, May 13, at Harford Technical High School, 200 Thomas Run Road in Bel Air, beginning at 7 p.m.
Aegis staff member Allan Vought contributed to this report.
This report has been updated to reflect a correction. The statements at the May 5 hearing on animal control legislation regarding decisions to euthanize animals brought to the Humane Society shelter were incorrectly attibuted. They were made by Jean Salvatore. Adam Wysocki, of No Kill Harford, talked only about the need for transparency in record keeping by the Humane Society at both hearings.