Mihaela Nikolova/Sofia Echo
They are sweet but sometimes they bite.
They are sweet but sometimes they bite.
BORIS Spirov, Deputy Mayor of Sofia, agrees that the street dogs are one of the most serious problems faced by the Municipality. He even lifted his trouser leg to show me a recent dog bite scar inflicted when he assisted a woman being attacked by three dogs.
"The problem is being dealt with," he assured me, but looked perplexed when I asked why, in that case, were there still numerous dogs on the streets with no significant sign of a decline over the past year.
"In 1998 there were 7 000 dog bite cases," said Spirov. "This year Sofia Municipality is confident that there will be no more than 3 000." I suggested that this figure was 3 000 too many and he again agreed but refused to accept that the Municipality had failed to successfully tackle the problem.
"We have eradicated the dog packs that used to roam the city centre and the problem should be under control within three years," he said, adding that the Municipality's street dog strategy has come up against major opposition from animal welfare NGOs and the public.
The media has been full of allegations and counter-allegations over the treatment of the dogs, but none of the allegations has stuck. The resulting atmosphere is one of suspicion and political intrigue.
According to Maria Kharbova, municipal councillor and head of the environmental committee of the Sofia Municipal Council, 500 000 leva is being spent on the strategy each year and yet the number of dogs has not diminished. She asserted that there has been no report on how Zoo Milosurdie (Zoo Charity), set up by the Municipality to deal with the dogs, has been using its funds.
Last month, a Bulgarian National Television documentary uncovered alleged malpractices at the Zoo Milosurdie dog shelter in Lozenets. The documentary makers interviewed former workers who stated that some dogs were beaten to death, instead of being given a lethal injection, in order to save money. The television crew was denied access to the shelter, along with Kharbova, when they attempted to verify the allegations, which remained, like so much of the media's information, unsubstantiated.
In a report made in 2001 by Dr Klaus Wagner, a German veterinarian specialist, it was found that Zoo Milosurdie's dog shelter was below EU standards. He observed that the cages were overcrowded, there was no separation between sick, aggressive, and healthy animals, and that they were fed only dry food and bread.
Marietta Sirmenova, Zoo Milosurdie's public relations officer, accepted Wagner's findings but said that Bulgaria is not Germany and that the shelter cannot afford to meet German standards.
Milosurdie's director Nikola Popov has strongly denied accusations of corruption and malpractice. He said that various national and international bodies had inspected the shelter and that no serious faults have been found. For that reason, the shelter's management has ignored the frequent complaints from NGOs.
"The dog protestors from the NGOs are fanatics," said Sirmenova. "They have some kind of dog mania and for them the life of a dog is more important than that of a person."
Zoo Milosurdie's dog collectors have to be escorted by two police officers when they leave the shelter in order to protect them from animal rights activists. "The public should be more informed about the real problem and not oppose the municipality or stop Zoo Milosurdie from doing its work," said Sirmenova. "If there was no interference from activists, we could deal with the dogs within months," she added.
Spirov's estimate of three years is slightly longer and, though he agrees that the NGOs are causing serious problems, he noted that a lack of funding and adequate facilities was also hindering the Municipality's efforts.
"The shelter in Lozenets is not big enough to deal with the problem as it only has space for 75 dogs," he said. "Without more resources and a greater capacity for sheltering dogs temporarily, it is impossible to solve the street dog problem swiftly and according to the law."
Until July this year, three NGOs in Sofia were receiving Municipality funding to neuter and then release street dogs. Over the past seven years approximately 10 000 street dogs were neutered in this way and given coloured collars to indicate their condition.
Sofia Mayor Stefan Sofianski announced in August that the Municipality would no longer fund this programme, and declared that it had not been successful.
Dr Wagner claimed that simply exterminating the street dogs was not enough because areas that are cleared of dogs quickly become repopulated. He strongly advised a full neutering and vaccination programme. But neutering is expensive at $10 a dog and, though Spirov accepted that neutering was effective, he said again that the municipality simply did not have the funding or facilities to neuter so many dogs.
Bulgaria's veterinary law has also created difficulties. It states that no homeless animals should be allowed to roam the streets and this means that any neutering policy is contrary to the law. It also makes no allowance for dogs that are neither completely homeless, nor domestic. Many such dogs exist in Sofia, either as guard dogs for warehouses and factories, or around tower blocks where they are fed by local people and do not pose a threat to the public.
When the shelter has collected such dogs in the past, there has been an immediate public outcry and media furore. For this reason, according to Spirov, the dog collectors now only catch dogs that have been reported by the public and confirmed in writing. "We're doing it this way to avoid further public upset," said Spirov. "But of course it slows down the whole process."
In the meantime Sofianski's election promise will be to deal with the street dogs within a year by adopting "dramatic measures."
Sofianski's new plan, which came into effect on October 30, will be in harmony with the veterinary law, and will override all previous Municipality dog strategies. Any dogs that Zoo Milosurdie releases for adoption will first be neutered and wormed for a fee of 25 leva. Details of adopters will be checked thoroughly and they will be obliged to sign a declaration confirming that the dog will be kept at home. Unclaimed dogs will be exterminated after 14 days.
In the meantime the general public will have to be increasingly vigilant as winter sets in and the dogs' food supplies dwindle. Some comfort can be drawn from the fact that in Bulgaria there were only four cases of dogs with rabies between 1991 and 2000.
"The problem is being dealt with," he assured me, but looked perplexed when I asked why, in that case, were there still numerous dogs on the streets with no significant sign of a decline over the past year.
"In 1998 there were 7 000 dog bite cases," said Spirov. "This year Sofia Municipality is confident that there will be no more than 3 000." I suggested that this figure was 3 000 too many and he again agreed but refused to accept that the Municipality had failed to successfully tackle the problem.
"We have eradicated the dog packs that used to roam the city centre and the problem should be under control within three years," he said, adding that the Municipality's street dog strategy has come up against major opposition from animal welfare NGOs and the public.
The media has been full of allegations and counter-allegations over the treatment of the dogs, but none of the allegations has stuck. The resulting atmosphere is one of suspicion and political intrigue.
According to Maria Kharbova, municipal councillor and head of the environmental committee of the Sofia Municipal Council, 500 000 leva is being spent on the strategy each year and yet the number of dogs has not diminished. She asserted that there has been no report on how Zoo Milosurdie (Zoo Charity), set up by the Municipality to deal with the dogs, has been using its funds.
Last month, a Bulgarian National Television documentary uncovered alleged malpractices at the Zoo Milosurdie dog shelter in Lozenets. The documentary makers interviewed former workers who stated that some dogs were beaten to death, instead of being given a lethal injection, in order to save money. The television crew was denied access to the shelter, along with Kharbova, when they attempted to verify the allegations, which remained, like so much of the media's information, unsubstantiated.
In a report made in 2001 by Dr Klaus Wagner, a German veterinarian specialist, it was found that Zoo Milosurdie's dog shelter was below EU standards. He observed that the cages were overcrowded, there was no separation between sick, aggressive, and healthy animals, and that they were fed only dry food and bread.
Marietta Sirmenova, Zoo Milosurdie's public relations officer, accepted Wagner's findings but said that Bulgaria is not Germany and that the shelter cannot afford to meet German standards.
Milosurdie's director Nikola Popov has strongly denied accusations of corruption and malpractice. He said that various national and international bodies had inspected the shelter and that no serious faults have been found. For that reason, the shelter's management has ignored the frequent complaints from NGOs.
"The dog protestors from the NGOs are fanatics," said Sirmenova. "They have some kind of dog mania and for them the life of a dog is more important than that of a person."
Zoo Milosurdie's dog collectors have to be escorted by two police officers when they leave the shelter in order to protect them from animal rights activists. "The public should be more informed about the real problem and not oppose the municipality or stop Zoo Milosurdie from doing its work," said Sirmenova. "If there was no interference from activists, we could deal with the dogs within months," she added.
Spirov's estimate of three years is slightly longer and, though he agrees that the NGOs are causing serious problems, he noted that a lack of funding and adequate facilities was also hindering the Municipality's efforts.
"The shelter in Lozenets is not big enough to deal with the problem as it only has space for 75 dogs," he said. "Without more resources and a greater capacity for sheltering dogs temporarily, it is impossible to solve the street dog problem swiftly and according to the law."
Until July this year, three NGOs in Sofia were receiving Municipality funding to neuter and then release street dogs. Over the past seven years approximately 10 000 street dogs were neutered in this way and given coloured collars to indicate their condition.
Sofia Mayor Stefan Sofianski announced in August that the Municipality would no longer fund this programme, and declared that it had not been successful.
Dr Wagner claimed that simply exterminating the street dogs was not enough because areas that are cleared of dogs quickly become repopulated. He strongly advised a full neutering and vaccination programme. But neutering is expensive at $10 a dog and, though Spirov accepted that neutering was effective, he said again that the municipality simply did not have the funding or facilities to neuter so many dogs.
Bulgaria's veterinary law has also created difficulties. It states that no homeless animals should be allowed to roam the streets and this means that any neutering policy is contrary to the law. It also makes no allowance for dogs that are neither completely homeless, nor domestic. Many such dogs exist in Sofia, either as guard dogs for warehouses and factories, or around tower blocks where they are fed by local people and do not pose a threat to the public.
When the shelter has collected such dogs in the past, there has been an immediate public outcry and media furore. For this reason, according to Spirov, the dog collectors now only catch dogs that have been reported by the public and confirmed in writing. "We're doing it this way to avoid further public upset," said Spirov. "But of course it slows down the whole process."
In the meantime Sofianski's election promise will be to deal with the street dogs within a year by adopting "dramatic measures."
Sofianski's new plan, which came into effect on October 30, will be in harmony with the veterinary law, and will override all previous Municipality dog strategies. Any dogs that Zoo Milosurdie releases for adoption will first be neutered and wormed for a fee of 25 leva. Details of adopters will be checked thoroughly and they will be obliged to sign a declaration confirming that the dog will be kept at home. Unclaimed dogs will be exterminated after 14 days.
In the meantime the general public will have to be increasingly vigilant as winter sets in and the dogs' food supplies dwindle. Some comfort can be drawn from the fact that in Bulgaria there were only four cases of dogs with rabies between 1991 and 2000.
