The Montgomery County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) was featured in a lengthy review by the Philadelphia Inquirer today titled “Euthanasia, understaffing, and broken kennels are rampant at Montco’s ultra-wealthy SPCA“.
The county’s SPCA has locations in Conshohocken, Perkiomenville, and Abington Township (1006 Edge Hill Road). According to their website, the Conshohocken facility houses the administrative offices and is the largest of the three. The Perkiomenville facility houses retired livestock and a shelter for small animals, and the Abington facility was constructed in 1997 “to further our service for eastern Montgomery County.” From their website:
We house lost, homeless, and unwanted pets in an effort to find them new homes or reunite them with their owners. All pets are kept safe and secure. They are provided loving care and treatment for any injuries or ailments until we are able to place them into a home.
Bernadette Creedon, a 65-year-old resident of Huntingdon Valley, told the Inquirer that she took a young stray pit bull to the Abington SPCA as a temporary home before he was fostered. After multiple visits to check on him, she arrived one day to learn that he had been euthanized after being deemed “unadoptable” due to aggression, biting, and growling.
Creedon said she was uninformed of the decision and doubts the accuracy of the SPCA’s justification.
The Inquirer’s detective work has apparently uncovered a pattern of misbehavior at Montco’s SPCA, which is also the wealthiest animal shelter collective in the state. According to 2023 IRE 990 filings, the shelter listed $67,266,146 in assets. The next closest sum was $25,604,807, listed by the Pennsylvania SPCA in Philadelphia. The shelter draws more than $1.7 million per year in donations and has nearly doubled its assets over the last decade to $50 million, the Inquirer said.
The shelter also has the lowest save rate among 11 shelters in the Philadelphia region, according to the Inquirer’s analysis, and operates without a foster program or adoption events.
Nine employees and seven volunteers at the Montco nonprofit said that “chronic understaffing, squalid kennel conditions, and casual euthanasia have become the norm, with little intervention from its executive director and the nonprofit’s board.”
“[Management] is very trigger-happy to put any animal down for any reason, which chills me because part of the job is saving these animals,” Bobbie-Jean Brown, 27, a former kennel technician, told the Inquirer.
OSHA notified management in July that it received complaints about black mold, broken kennel runs, and improperly working kennel drains, which staff and volunteers documented with photos and videos.
Carmen Ronio, 79, the shelter’s executive director who now makes over $250,000 a year, declined an interview. Its board of directors declined to answer detailed questions, and its full-time veterinarian, Corey McCann, did not respond to a request for comment and allegedly resigned on Tuesday.
Operations manager Edward Davies told the Inquirer that the claims are exaggerated.
“We don’t make snap decisions,” Davies said. “We hold onto animals that are difficult to place. But how would you feel if I adopted out a pit bull next to you that hates cats, and you do have a cat that wanders around your property? I’m gonna have to weigh the safety of everybody.”
For more on the Montgomery Count SPCA, you can visit their Facebook page. Yelp reviews can be found here.
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Photos: Yelp.com