http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/23/ny...ewanted=1&_r=1
“Animal Precinct,” the six-year-old reality TV series, has long been more than just a gritty chronicle of the A.S.P.C.A. police unit that specializes in rescuing animals victimized by cruelty in New York City.
A hit since its first season, the cable show on the Animal Planet channel has given millions of Americans new insight into animal abuse, raised money for the society and elevated the stature of officers who had previously occupied law enforcement’s lower tier.
“Years ago other law enforcement might bark when we walked into the precincts,” said Annemarie Lucas, an A.S.P.C.A. supervisory investigator who is featured in many episodes. “Now they can’t help you enough.”
But for all the good the show has done, some animal welfare activists and others who monitor cruelty conditions in New York say it depicts a level of enforcement that is at odds with the reality on the streets.
The activists say that beyond the televised successes, the A.S.P.C.A. is struggling to respond to a growing number of cruelty complaints, driven in part by the popularity of the show. Cruelty complaints have risen 70 percent since 2000. Yet the budget for the society’s police force of 18 officers remains small, about 6 percent of the A.S.P.C.A.’s $58 million spending plan.
And though the unit has grown in recent years, officials acknowledge they still do not have the resources to put more than two officers on the night shift, answer the cruelty hot line after 6 p.m. or call back every person who reports a case of abuse in a city with 5 million animals.
In light of the challenges, some activists say the television show has been a mixed blessing: a call to action, but one that may mask the need for a more robust response by the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
“If they are going to profit from the TV show, they should hire more officers,” said Gary Perkinson, a former A.S.P.C.A. manager and one of several people who say officers never responded to reports of abuse they had phoned in.
Officials for the A.S.P.C.A., a nonprofit group that does not receive government funding, call the criticism unfair, asserting that the “animal cops” have never been more effective, that the unit’s budget has been increased and that arrests are up significantly over prior years.
Dale Riedel, 57, a retired New York police captain who directs the unit, known as the Humane Law Enforcement division, calls it a model for the country. Expectations must be realistic, he said. “We are not a 911 agency,” he said. “We don’t have a radio car that can be there in five minutes’ time.”
Given its name and its status as the nation’s oldest animal welfare organization, the A.S.P.C.A. is often mistaken for a national umbrella organization. Actually, the 141-year-old group operates independently of all other S.P.C.A.’s across the country, although it does help many with grants and training and works to spread its message nationally with lobbying and education efforts.
“They are dedicated and effective and knowledgeable,” Regina Massaro, founder of the Spay Neuter Intervention Project in New York, an independent group, said of A.S.P.C.A. officials.
Increasingly, since the cable series first aired in 2001, the face of the A.S.P.C.A. has been Ms. Lucas, the pretty, assertive animal welfare investigator. She is the host of fund-raising infomercials and has become one of the society’s highest paid employees, earning $141,000 a year, according to its last financial filing. That is more than the amount paid to her boss, Mr. Riedel, and to the veterinarian who is the director of medicine for the society’s animal hospital.