12/01/2024
To all my animal loving clients. Our Riverside County Shelters Kill more animals than any shelter in the COUNTRY!!! The county supervisors keep putting unqualified people in charge of the shelters. So their way of trying to shut us up was to hire a woman who has no qualifications and has failed in other cities. So we as taxpayers are demanding they fire the chief supervisor responsible for this mess and cancel the contract. Below is the information from the lawyer bringing the case. Please come to the meetings and or write your city council and demand they cancel the $2.5 million Hassen contract.
USE YOUR VOICE FOR THE ANIMALS!!!
The Board of Supervisors meets Tuesday, December 3rd, at 9:30 a.m., at 4080 Lemon St., Riverside. People can speak either in person or by telephone during the public forum portion of the meeting.
The Riverside county Animal Commission meets Thursday, December 5th, at 9:30 a.m., at Coachella Valley Animal Campus, 72050 Pet Land Place, Thousand Palms.
The core points we want the Board and Commission to hear are (1) the $2.5M boondoggle Hassen contract should be cancelled (which is permitted, without cause, under para. 5.1 of contract with 30 days notice), (2) Van Wagenen should be removed from his position for his violations of the public trust and his fiduciary duties that flow therefrom, including nepotism, favoritism and financial imprudence, and (3) Van Wagenen, as is permitted under the taxpayer statute, should be compelled to provide restitution to the County for the wasted taxpayer funds.
The gist of the taxpayer case is this: Van Wagenen appointed Gettis as Director of the Department of Animal Services not based on merit (as the Riverside County Employee handbook requires) as she had no experience or qualifications for the position, but instead as a favor to her spouse who was County Counsel for Riverside, removed her as Director two weeks after our first case was filed and publicly spun it as a “promotion” to an Executive Director position with Riverside University Health System (again, with no experience in health care or patient management), and then signed up Hassen to a $2.5M contract (Los Angeles paid $25,000 for a Hassen evaluation) to fix the mess he created in the first place by hiring Gettis.
The Hassen approach—based on keeping animals out of the shelter and uncared for in the community—is more akin to the 1800’s, and has been shown to be a disaster in every community that has hired her. $2.5M would be much better spent on animal care, than enriching Hassen, and could be spent on expanding spay/neuter options, increasing shelter space to protect more animals, or hiring an experienced and caring Director of Animal Services.
If the Hassen approach was followed in Riverside county, resulting in more dogs and cats denied intake and left roaming on the streets, there would be an exponential increase in strays being taken to the Palm Springs shelter, thereby overburdening the shelter and causing yet more damage to our community.
The authenticity of any presentation comes from your own words, and the many animal advocates in our community, and the experience each of you have, so if you or others choose to speak, please focus on what is important to you since other the presence of other speakers will ensure the breadth of issues raised.
Please feel free to email or call me (760.423.5397) if you have any questions or concerns. Thank you.
Dan Bolton
Attorney
Walter Clark Legal Group
t: 7608629254
d: 7604235397
f: 7608621121
