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Transparency, accountability and honesty.
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Above are three words that don't appear to exist in the vocabulary of the USDA Wildlife Services.
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If one scrolls through hundreds of articles posted on (27) GooseWatch NYC or (61) Call of the Canada Geese, one will notice a common thread:
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That is that the typical wildlife carnage conducted by USDA WS (most notably, Canada goose roundups for slaughter or gassing) are done without community notification or input (i.e. transparency).
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Citizens simply awake one morning to find all of the geese of their local park, college campus, wildlife "refuge," or community lake gone.
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In those cases where people question or notify the media, an article sometimes results.
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Those journalists actually bothering to take a little time to investigate will usually report that a contract was taken out on the geese for "removal" and "euthanasia" by city or town officials and the USDA.
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Then there is the rush for excuses:
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"The geese poop!" or "Someone complained!" or (in the case of NYC), "The geese fly into planes!"
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But, usually the press does not bother to question or investigate the reasons given for the "cull" or actual evidence to the claims.
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Rather, reporters just run USDA statements verbatim -- including the claim of "euthanasia" despite the fact that neither gassing nor slaughter of healthy animals represents "euthanasia" even when loosely applied.
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Sometimes distraught citizens hold memorials for the slain geese or set up Facebook pages dedicated to them.
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But, in time (as NY State Director of APHIS, USDA Wildlife Services, Martin Lowney, asserts) people "move on" and all is generally forgotten -- until the following year when similar roundups are likely to reoccur.
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And the cycle starts all over again.
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Certainly, we in New York City are well accustomed to the annual USDA goose roundups now.
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So much so that some newspapers now report them with, "Its that time of year again!" -- as if the citizens of NYC should view goose massacres as some kind of annual event like July 4th fireworks or the Macy's Thanksgiving parade:
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And sadly, as the years have passed and now thousands of NYC geese have been either gassed or slaughtered at the hands of USDA WS, media coverage has become even more anemic, accepting and acting more as a mouthpiece for government sponsored wildlife slaughters than a watchdog to it.
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All USDA has to say is "Captain Sully" and the NYC media laps it up like a Cocker Spaniel puppy.
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It is now July 15th and presumably USDA goose roundups are over for this year in New York City.
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But, even this we do not know as "fact."
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We do know that at least five hundred New York City geese were sent to their deaths so far this summer.
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But, with the exceptions of Jamaica Bay Wildlife "Refuge," Inwood Park and a small park on Manhattan's West Side, we don't know the actual locations nor do we know complete numbers. (And the only reason we know three targeted locations is due to citizen eye witnesses.)
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It is all one big, nearly perfectly kept secret.
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And indeed, the only reason more New Yorkers are not protesting the goose massacres is because even years after the fact, most New Yorkers are not even the slightest bit aware of them.
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Government "transparency and accountability?"
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It is more like, Don't Ask, Don't Tell.
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As for "honesty" on the part of USDA, we have been through that movie many times before. But below is another, more recent example of USDA "openness and honesty:"
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According to USDA WS spokesperson, Carol Bannerman, "The USDA killed 290 geese from New York City in 2012 -- 285 fewer than in 2011." (Emphasis supplied.)
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Ms. Bannerman fails to mention the 751 geese USDA rounded up and slaughtered from Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge in 2012.
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The address for Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge is: 175-10 Cross Bay Blvd. Queens, NY. 11693.
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Someone should inform Bannerman that Queens is one of the five boroughs of New York City. -- But, she most likely already knows this.
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Once again, we have either blatant lie on the part of USDA or deliberate attempt to mislead and deceive both, the media and the public.
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But, do reporters every bother to question or actually research the statements from USDA?
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No.
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Why, after all, should a reporter have to look up "euthanasia" in a dictionary? Or, look on a map of New York City to see where Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge is located?
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Whatever USDA says it is so, must be so.
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Just don't bother to question the truth and facts of it.
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Don't Ask, Don't Tell. -- PCA
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