GARDEN ROUTE NEWS - Four Garden Route (GR) SPCA committee members have resigned following the suspension of three staff at the SPCA. It was announced two weeks ago that the three staff had been suspended.
Two of the staff are at the Mossel Bay branch of the GR SPCA and the third, at the George branch.
The staff were suspended following allegations made against them.
The Mossel Bay Advertiser decided not to publish the suspended staff's names because of the seeming dissent in the committee about the suspensions. Should the staff be found innocent, publication of their names would cause damage to their reputations.
The following have resigned from the GR SPCA committee: chair Wendy Jones; the former chair of 12 years, who then became a committee member, Heather Church; Gay Gregory, a retired senior SPCA inspector with more than 26 years on the committee; and treasurer Chantel van den Heever.
Those left on the GR SPCA committee are: Joey Sellner, acting as chair in Jones' place; Bruno MacDonald, who joined the committee in July last year; Michele Gratz, formerly a Mossel Bay municipal manager, who joined the committee in 2017; Marius de Waal; and Rita Brock.
The resigned committee members refused to comment to the Mossel Bay Advertiser.
Church only told the Mossel Bay Advertiser this week that Jones had been an "excellent chair" in her opinion.
Church resigned as chair at the AGM in July last year simply because she felt a change was needed on the committee and Jones would make a good chair.
After the Mossel Bay Advertiser put questions to the GR SPCA, it issued a statement regarding the staff suspensions, noting:
"Two hearings are scheduled to begin tomorrow (Wednesday). No date has been scheduled for the third."
"The duration of the hearings is at the discretion of the independent person chairing them. We cannot comment on an ongoing legal process."
MacDonald was handling all press queries this week on behalf of the committee.
The staff suspensions followed closely after GR SPCA senior inspector Salomé Bruins, based in George, resigned from the SPCA in February.
Municipal community services director Elize Nel told the Mossel Bay Advertiser on enquiry this week that the municipality grants the SPCA in Mossel Bay more than R1 million per year in terms of the Constitution.
This annual grant is to cover the cost of the SPCA managing the municipal pound for stray animals and other operating costs of the SPCA.
Derminite Matthysen with his dog Splinter and friend Francois Mysner. Splinter was being dipped at the SPCA.
A mom and her two children with Tess (behind), a staffer at the Mossel Bay branch of the GR SPCA. The family were visiting the SPCA, looking to adopt a dog.
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