Dear Wayne Pacelle
Guest blog by Carrie Mess, Wisconsin Dairy Farmer (www.dairycarrie.com)
Reprinted with permission
Dear Wayne,
I hope you’re not offended by my calling you Wayne. You don’t know me but my name is Carrie Mess and I am a Wisconsin Dairy Farmer. A few weeks ago you posted an open letter to Agriculture Journalists and Leaders. While I’m just a blogger and don’t consider myself anywhere near a journalist, I do think of myself as a leader in my community, so I am taking your letter to be directed towards me and my peers.
After reading your open letter, I had a few thoughts that I wanted to share in response. I like your format so I figured an open letter back would work well. Your letter is pretty long winded so I’m just going to pull out a few bullet points to discuss.
- It’s quite obvious that you don’t care for Rick Berman and Humane Watch. If I was in your current position after years of being fast and loose with the facts and I suddenly had a group calling my organization out, I wouldn’t like them much either. I find it funny that you call out Rick Berman for being a lobbyist when HSUS spends millions on lobbying each year.
- You state that the HSUS is governed by a 27 person board of directors and that those directors are unpaid volunteers. That sounds about right for a nonprofit organization to me. However, according to the HSUS 2012 tax filing you make $347,000 a year. Your organization has another 38 people making over $100,000 a year. I know that my local human society would be able to make a world of difference with just a fraction of your salary. How many animals would be helped if you took a pay cut and sent that money on to local shelters?
- You claim that HSUS has the highest charity rating from the Better Business Bureau and Charity Navigator. Never mind that the Better Business Bureau is Pass/Fail and seems to have serious issues with your organization. In the last 12 years, HSUS has only been ranked at the top of Charity Navigator’s scale 50% of time. You also leave out your D grade from Charity Watch.
To read the rest visit http://dairycarrie.com/2014/02/10/dear-wayne-pacelle/
Posted by Farm and Food Care on March 24th, 2014 :: Filed under Activism,Agricultural Advocates,Animal care,Misconceptions
Tags :: activists, animal rights, HSUS, misconceptions
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