Linda Gottwald Speaks About the Record of SUFA

...and the Treatment SUFA Received From an "Appreciative" County

EDITOR'S NOTE:  During my recent campaign for Clerk, I had the pleasure to get to know Linda Gottwald of SUFA, as the issue was one that had come up at numerous forums.  Linda was persecuted by an out of control abusive County Administration with ulterior motivation, and the public was only privy to the information those same administrators disseminated to the press.  As a result, our County is exposed once again to legal action, and justifiably so.  Until the cronies at the top are held accountable, we will continue to reward the best performers with this same "appreciative" treatment.  Below is one exchange Linda and I enjoyed.

From Linda; 

When SUFA assumed the contract, we re-opened the Big Pine shelter ( a relatively new structure that had been sitting empty and unused for years).  We also started a low cost spay/neuter clinic, especially for the feral cats of the middle keys.  (the same cats  the feds are spending thousands of dollars with useless studies and forums on - with their budget, we could have had the population completely sterilized by now)

SUFA opened both shelters on weekends, doubled the hours the Marathon shelter was open and held annual animal law seminars for the state attorney, MCSO, and anyone who was interested. We hosted the annual Animal Hero banquets.  We started the PAL program for troubled kids so that they could work with animals, promoted the anti-chaining law for Monroe County.  We had the highest adoption rate and lowest euthanasia rate in the County and spent thousands of dollars building a cage-free enclosures for the cats and fences so dogs could go outside.  All on our own initiative and nickel, using donated funds.

SUFA received donations from all over the world and I spent countless hours researching and writing grant proposals.  We worked hard, were frugal with our money and carefully started a nest egg to expand our work for animals.  We won every cruelty case we initiated.  Our achievements and ideas were recognized by national magazines and organizations as prestigious as Best Friends and the Animal Legal Defense Fund.

And what did Monroe County do to show their appreciation?  .

   - Dent Pierce,  pouting because his friend Gwen Hawtof, then-SPCA director, lost the contract (he was supporting her more than the organization itself), threw roadblocks every chance he could.  I will never forget his response when I first received the County trucks that were in terrible shape.  ("We promised you two trucks - we didn't say what condition they would be in.")

   -The BOCC tried to oust SUFA in 2007.

   -The Clerk's office tried to initiate criminal charges against me for everything from forgery to theft in an attempt to justify seizing our bank accounts.

   -Public Works  bulldozed the cat enclosures, locked up the Big Pine shelter and the spay/neuter clinic and reduced the Marathon shelter hours.

None of this, by  the way, saved the taxpayers any money...the succeeding contractor (SPCA) received more money than SUFA ever did....(SPCA one year later lost contract to SHARK-not sure what SHARK's current reimbursement is)  And there were never any photos of the building being chained or stories of services cut - yet the media, with the exception of KWTN, happily reported story after story of the evils I had done, often copying County press releases verbatim.

For me, the final straw came at the August BOCC  meeting in 2010.  I was reprimanded for daring to tell Kolhage his auditors needed to make an appointment before ravaging our office and records.  Kim Wigington, who has never held a  job in the private sector in her life, made snide remarks about SUFA.  George Neugent blatantly lied and played to the cameras and all the other commissioners joined in on the kill.  In eight years, not a single one of them had ever set foot in our shelters.   Yet they were suddenly experts -

A typical case of inept government trying to tell a highly successful PRIVATE corporation how to run a business.

EDITOR'S NOTE: I then asked Linda to illustrate how BOCC Commissioner George Neugent had lied, to which she responded with the following:

Neugent announced at the Aug. 2010 BOCC meeting that there were no locals on the SUFA board and he repeated this later on the Bill Becker AM magazine radio show. At that time we had two board members -Maya Totman, of Big Pine Key, Pete Meyers of Little Torch Key who live in the Keys year round.  A third board member, Larry Hirsch was a part-time resident of Key West.

Larry and I had lobbied for the anti-chaining law together, visiting the commissioners and he had served on an airport committee with Wigington, so she was well aware that he was local.

This info was on our Florida Corporation Annual Report, easily available on-line. A SUFA employee heard the show and called and called Becker  to correct it, but Neugent never apologized or bothered to correct his statement.

It is on the Aug. 2010 BOCC meeting-video on demand, under the SUFA agenda.

Ironically, when SHARK incorporated, (the current contractor for Marathon), Glenn Buckley was listed as a local board member.  And his address?  10803 Aviation Blvd., my former residence !  Dr. Buckely is a very nice man who lived in Fort Lauderdale.  He had helped SUFA in the past and I am sure he would have been willing to help SHARK but he NEVER lived at that address.