New Research From ADL on Brenda Barnette

ADL-LA received an e-mail from a rescuer in Seattle who asked us to call her immediately because she wanted to talk with us about Brenda Barnette; so of course we called-immediately! A summary of that conversation is below taken from our notes on most of the issues she covered in our hour long phone conversation with her. She asked us not to identify her because she believes Barnette may be a bit disquieted by one of the issues she talked about which is of a 'personal nature.' BUT. . . since ADL-LA's ONLY concern is for the homeless and lost animals of LA City, we had a meeting with our board of directors and decided to share this 'particular' personal information with you. If Barnette wants to get upset with ADL-LA for revealing this to our readers, she has the right to do that; GM's have been upset with ADL-LA before so we're used to it! ADL-LA doesn't give a HOOT about anyone's personal information or what they do in their personal lives, UNLESS it is affecting (in a negative or positive way) the animals. That's when we believe this information is important enough that our readers know about it.  


Summary of phone conversation-we have quoted her where we could:The "rescuer" whom we'll call 'Gail' said that before Barnette became CEO of SHS (Seattle Humane Society) the volunteer, foster care and especially the rescue communities of Seattle were going through a bad time. Gail said there was a lot of in-fighting and competition and nothing much was getting done because of that. She said that "Some rescuers are part of the problem, NOT part of the solution." She explained that some rescuers in Seattle were involved in rescue for the wrong reasons; either they had no life, they wanted something to build up their ego, they were bored or they were whiners who Gail stated were the type that got ". . . .some kind of 'secondary gain' by complaining about the high kill rate and why nothing was being done about it but then not doing anything to try and CHANGE it!"  

In walks Barnette six years ago. Gail said she is neither a charismatic person nor a self promoter. In fact she told us that Barnette has a ". . unique personality" that she couldn't put into words, and has very ". . . .  strong mental capabilities that keeps her head to the ground focused on saving animals."  Barnette simply doesn't take the time be a "self promoter" or talk/blog about her accomplishments. Gail said Barnette spends her time trying to keep focused on ways to save lives, not chatting with people unless they are willing to help save the lives of what Barnette calls her "wonderful animals." Gail also said that Barnette is

". . .tenacious, persistent and never lets her eye off the goal of saving as many lives as possible." She also added that Barnette is a fair but a tough CEO who wants people to work as hard as she does in saving animals' lives; and if they don't, they should ". . . . . just leave her alone and let her do her job!"    

Since Barnette didn't spend all day everyday informing the community in Seattle of her accomplishments when she arrived, at first the Seattle humane community didn't really know what to think about her. But then they started seeing real, actual and genuine results like (and again we quote Gail here) ". . .a 20% decrease in the amount of animals' killed at an 'open door' shelter because of Barnette implementing life saving programs starting her first year as CEO of SHS." 

Gail then told us that something strange happened within the humane community of Seattle; those who were really sincere about helping animals stepped up to the plate and those who were involved for other reasons were, using Gail's word "Exorcized" from the humane community and became outcasts! Gail said that there are some people in the Seattle rescue and humane community who were ". . . .just plain toxic!" Gail said now they have a very tight group of hundreds of sincere and enthusiastic rescuers, volunteers and fosters who focus on the positive life saving programs Barnette implemented and they simply don't listen to the negative, toxic people who are stuck in the old way of thinking about animal control. Gail told us that there were people in their humane community who didn't even embrace NO KILL! 
How archaic is that? These negative people were so entrenched in the old ways of animal control that they thought NO KILL was a dirty word! (ADL-LA Notes: At least we don't have those stupid, narrow minded kind of people here in the LA humane community well, unless you count Phyllis Dougherty! But she's so old she fart's dust!) 

Anyway here comes the personal part and again ADL-LA and it's board agonized over whether we should include this information but we came to the conclusion that our readers have a right to know; apparently when Barnette first became CEO of SHS she was a single mother with two teen-aged kids. Now they're adults, but Gail said that one of her kids a son, was a "special need's" kid. Gail told us that they are now both on their own, her daughter going to college, but the very few people Barnette ever told about her "special need's" child were awe struck by her ability to multi-task and raise two teens, one with special needs and still be completely focused on and implement life saving programs for the animals resulting in a current LIVE SAVE RATE OF 92%!

Gail then went into a tirade about the false rumors, misconstrued statements and exaggerated untruths about Barnette by a few people in Los Animals and that some people in Seattle have gotten wind of this and are fuming about it! Gail said that any city should count themselves lucky to have someone of her caliber, and the ones spreading fears about Barnette should be "exorcized" quickly by the humane community! (ADL-LA Notes: Gail was a riot to talk to on the phone!) Gail said and we quote her here again,  "Get rid of toxic people within your humane community who are complainers, downers and who don't know how to roll up their sleeves and want to do this kind of work  because they sincerely want to save animals' lives. If it's about their ego or anything else that doesn't have to do with sincerely saving the lives of animals, then get rid of them!!" 
Remember, all ADL-LA cares about is getting ANIMALS' LIVES SAVED; we don't care about money (we have none,) we don't care about fame, (we maybe be "infamous" but never famous,) and we don't care WHO takes credit for saving the animals because all the animals' care about is being saved; by whom or how, they could care less!    

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I like the part about expectating employees to work as hard as she does. When she gets to know the DAS employees better, she will find out that many of them don't work at all. There are employees who have been at this Department 20+ years who don't know or care to know the meaning of the word "work". How Barnette deals with this will make or break her.

Wait until she starts working at the Administration building and observes what goes on there.

Kianna~ said...

This is one serious angel. "Roll up them sleeves and step up to the plate." Not an amusement park.

Kianna~

Anonymous said...

New "research?" This is an opinion of some anonymous "Gail" person and not research at all. And the word "angel" is not applicable to Barnette.

Kianna~ said...

Your right. No one's perfect; but she sounds better than some.

Too bad she supports dog breeding. Too many dog relinquishments. Too many dogs people decide they don't want much too late after the dogs have bonded with a family who they thought loved them and instead betrayed them and turned their backs on them.

Better to have someone else do the dirty work by locking them up somewhere and having them killed at a later date because the dogs have outgrown their cuteness and weren't so lovable after all.

Kianna~