On June 30, our organization met with Mr. Bajram Gecaj and Mr. Lulzim Fushtica from the Municipality of Pristina to discuss the latest initiatives of the Municipality regarding stray dogs.
Initially, the municipality is not proceeding with the shelter initiative, as there are no shelters licensed to keep dogs, which is very good news. Community dogs are adapted to their surroundings and must stay on the street.
We have talked about the adoption subsidy and we have expressed all our concerns about this subsidy as it can attract abusive people to collect dogs, so the Municipality has promised that the contract for adoption will provide some conditions to avoid abuse and also we asked to see and comment on the adoption contract. It has been promised that they will form a working group to examine this contract and everything else, together with the civil society and also the individual activists who are interested to be involved.
Anyone who is interested in being in this working group, notify the Municipality at this email address: lulzim.fushtica@rks-gov.net
It is promised that the subsidy will also apply to people who take care of the community’s dogs. We have continuously asked institutions to support activists in their work for the care and rescue of dogs or cats. This will be a good opportunity for all animal lovers who care about community dogs in their neighborhoods.
The Municipality of Pristina has informed us that it is in the process of operationalizing the temporary treatment center (TCC) for the CNVR projects and has informed us that from next year, the CNVR in Pristina will be carried out in the Municipality’s TCC. The Municipality has promised that the staff that will be engaged in the Municipality’s TCC will be trained. The municipality has said that the center will be open to all citizens who wish to visit the center, but has also called for animal protection activists to apply for the open positions for engagement within the center at all times. If spaying and neutering is done in one center and the work is controlled/monitored at all times, the opportunities for negligence, abuse or fraud become much smaller. Better project management and control is needed and unfortunately, this aspect has always been lacking and the dogs are the ones who suffer.
We have raised our ongoing concerns about the lack of transparency in the CNVR project processes, since our organization has requested to receive the list of operations from veterinarians every month so that monitoring can be done more efficiently, but this data has never been given to us as we requested. The last data we received was through AIP (Agency for Information and Privacy). At the meeting, we were told that whenever the Municipality has those data/statistics ready, it will report them to anyone who requests them. Our organization does not agree with this approach, as it is essential to evaluate the data (on a monthly basis) reported by veterinarians for treated dogs, to prevent any irregularities or fraud in time. The municipality as the contracting authority must ensure that such projects are implemented properly and that animal welfare is a priority. Our organization has requested to meet with the contract manager for the CNVR project to discuss and review the complaints that have been sent for some cases. All those who are interested in being part of the meeting, write to us at info@animalrights-rks.org.
Our organization has again raised the concern for sheltering dogs, emphasizing that community dogs adapted to the surroundings they live in, should not be involved in such initiatives, as long as there are many other dogs that need shelter, since the municipality of Pristina also has plans for the construction of a “dog park” as a regional center, for which they have opened an international call for a feasibility study. This study could show the Municipality what high costs are required for running a shelter and perhaps even gives an even stronger argument for the Municipality not to focus on sheltering dogs but the source of the problem: dogs with keepers (owners).
We call on all those who have raised concerns in recent days to notify the municipality to become part of the working group, and not to miss this opportunity for cooperation with the municipality to coordinate on many aspects, always with the main focus being humane treatment and dog/animal welfare.
Also, as always, we call on everyone who finds irregularities or fraud during the CNVR project to report to the municipality (and FVA) any doubt or complaint they have.