Date:               3/14/06

Subject:           AGREEMENT WITH PARKS TERMINATED

To:                  Persons interested in the Woodland Park Rabbit Relocation Project

From:              House Rabbit Society & Best Little Rabbit, Rodent & Ferret House

 

Barb DeCaro of Woodland Park, contacted me today, to voice how upset Parks is that I went public with the reason the project was postponed. That because I exposed “internal problems” (the situation at Magnuson,) I “had made the entire City Parks organization look bad.” She went on to say, that she was terminating our agreement between Ken Bounds of Seattle City Parks and our organization.

 

I am definitely not a politically savvy person. I’m a person doing rescue work and have the best interest of the animals, in this case rabbits, foremost in my mind. I did not think that some human might become irate, because I gave the facts of the situation to a reporter. In my opinion, terminating this agreement to relocate the rabbits is a very petty thing for Seattle City Parks to do. It is not in the best interest of the rabbits, nor will it stop the destruction occurring at Woodland and Greenlake Parks. Nor will it retract the story of what happened at Magnuson.

 

I worked very hard for the past year and jumped through all the hoops that were put in the way of relocating the rabbits. Why on earth did it take a year? I was told that Parks does not move fast. I gave Parks a deadline of January 16th, to begin trapping the rabbits. Then (1) Magnuson could not come up with a building. (2) The agreement between our organization and Parks had not been signed (even though I was given the “final” agreement back on November 30th.) (3) etc., etc. Much against my better judgment, Barb DeCaro talked me into agreeing to begin the project the last couple of days in Feb. However, even in hindsight, if we had waited until fall, and Magnuson Park did not want us there, this situation might still have occurred.

 

WHAT NOW?

100% of the donations we have collected WILL go to the Woodland Park Rabbits. We currently have 52 rabbits to be spayed/neutered, medicated for parasites and cared for until they are relocated. That will now likely cost more than the estimated $100 per rabbit ($5,200.) We’ve had to add a 2nd trash pickup each week. That alone will add around $300 (or $6 pr rabbit.) Our water bill will go up as will our electric bill. We will post on this website a full accounting of the funds we have collected and what they were spent on. We can do this in approximately 30 days or once all of the adult rabbits are altered. At that time, we will also provide a fairly accurate estimate, as to what it will cost to spay/neuter the baby rabbits when they reach sexual maturity. (Males 3 months, females 4 months.)

 

We are prepared to turn over to Parks all of the items we have purchased with your donations which were earmarked for this project. This includes 40 cages, water containers, fences and some smaller items, with the understanding that these items will be used for the rabbits. (Our organization does not have the facilities to store 40 cages and the other items.) As a non-profit organization, we can not legally turn over cash to Seattle City Parks. These funds were donated to our organization and we have receipted the donors. If the project is picked up again in the future, we will use the remaining funds to pay veterinarians for spay/neuters. If for any reason the relocation does not occur, the remaining funds will be used to care for the 52 Woodland Park rabbits for the remainder of their lives. As of today, we have stopped accepting donations for the Woodland Park rabbits.

 

Barb DeCaro stated: “There are other rescue organizations.” TRUE.

“There are other rabbit sanctuaries.”  FALSE. There is one organization in Washington State that has taken rabbits and let them run free on several acres. This is not a sanctuary. There are individuals who would like some of the park rabbits put on their property. That is not a sanctuary. There are definitely places where the rabbits could be sent. But be very clear, they would not be sent to a sanctuary. They would be living, as they have done at Woodland Park, subject to predators and early death. If this satisfies Parks and accomplishes the relocation AND everyone understands the rabbit’s fate, then that is another option for Parks.

 

It is with much regret and sadness that I’ve had to write this,

Sandi Ackerman

Executive Director

Best Little Rabbit, Rodent & Ferret House

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Date:               3/10/06

We never expected this project to end only 8 days after it had begun.

What happened on Tuesday, March 7th was that Magnuson rented the bottom floor of the building we housed the rabbits in to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) to hold “training exercises.” After speaking with the DEA person in charge, he told me that this was the first time Magnuson had put them in this building. All previous training exercises had been held in a different location. In other words, the officials at Magnuson knew exactly what kind of training exercises they did. And being the pessimist that I am, I have to wonder if they did this in order to get us to leave. If so, they succeeded. (Magnuson officials had never wanted us in their facilities. It was only on the insistence of Ken Bounds that we were assigned to a building.)

 

What were they training for? They pretended to break in and arrest or kill drug dealers. This entails lots of shouting and SHOOTING! I assume they were shooting blanks, but it sure sounded like real guns firing. This was directly downstairs under the rabbits. After being guaranteed by Magnuson, that the upstairs of the building was ours, the DEA was told that they could use the restroom where our rabbits were housed and so were running up and down the stairs.

 

The volunteers who had been out to clean and feed the rabbits can attest that the rabbits were already frightened, and they bolted at every small noise or movements. Putting up with the shouting and shooting all day Tuesday was enough for me to make the decision to get the rabbits out of that building so they wouldn’t be subjected to even one more day of torment.

 

Where do we go from here? We have picked up only 48 rabbits plus a litter of 4, born Thursday (3/9/06) morning. All but 5 of the females have already been spayed. The remaining 5 will be spayed this coming week, unless they give birth. We will continue to need volunteers to clean/feed these rabbits for the next 4 weeks until the rabbits can be moved to Rabbit Meadows Sanctuary.

 

We fully intend to complete this project, however we now must locate a safe place to house the rabbits. Obviously Magnuson Park will not be helpful in that regards and if we are unable to locate a suitable place, the project will be delayed until we can. We will need a central place, in order to attract volunteers, preferably indoors. Perhaps a warehouse or unused building that someone will let us occupy for 3-4 months. If you know of any such place, please get in touch with us. I’ll put a request on craigslist.com and other Internet sites. We are now hoping to resume this project sometime in the fall.

 

All in all, fall will be a better time anyway. Right now, when the weather is good, park goers are out there feeding the rabbits, and that means they are not interested in entering our traps for the food we use to lure them.

 

Sandi Ackerman

Executive Director

Best Little Rabbit, Rodent & Ferret House

14317 Lake City Way NE, Seattle