As reported in the June 17, 2015 edition of the Pilot (http://bit.ly/1GnFaMN), “Last September, Debbie Manzione was leaving Chesapeake Square Mall when a cat crossed her path in the parking lot.
The devoted cat lover retrieved some dry cat food from her car, and followed the animal to nearby shrubbery where she saw other felines. She set out the food and headed home.
Since then, Manzione said she has returned several times to feed them. Other people were doing the same, she said - some every week.
About two weeks ago, as she has done before, she captured a few of the strays, had them neutered and paid for their shots. The pair are now in what she calls "foster care" to determine whether they can be domesticated or sent to a farm. Previously she's taken away seven cats, including a female who later gave birth to four kittens.
The Suffolk resident was happy to help the animals. At least until last week, when she came home from work to find a Chesapeake police officer and an animal control officer waiting for her.
They gave her a court summons to appear in General District Court”
Maybe Chief Wright and his department can give her the summons and charge her because the wonderful
mayor of Chesapeake, Alan P. Krasnoff (http://bit.ly/1JYjKwU)
doesn’t give a damn about the animals in Chesapeake. That’s been made pretty
clear time and time again until a bunch of Chesapeake residents got together (http://bit.ly/1K1de6N and http://bit.ly/1QFBwJe) to demand changes to
the way the city shelter dealt with animals and the way they euthanized those
they didn’t like, such as Pits, Rottweilers or just about anything bigger than
the kennel manager Tracy Stevens. And if you know who Tracy is, just about
every dog that ends up at the shelter is bigger than her. We’ll get back to the
shelter a little later.
Maybe Chief Wright can do as he pleases when it comes to
doing next to nothing to help Chesapeake animals because, along with Mayor
Krasnoff, he has the city council who doesn’t do much of anything at all when
it comes to trying to make things better for the animals. You have the wonderful S.Z. “Debbie”
Ritter (http://bit.ly/1JYjXQL) who has made
it clear time and time again that she fully supports euthanizing animals of
Chesapeake and does nothing to try and make things better. Actually, she goes
out of her way to make things even more difficult and if anyone says anything
about her, Mayor Krasnoff is quick to jump up and put an end to it. Meeting
with Ms Ritter is next to impossible as she is one of the rudest most obnoxious
members of the city council, but why not, she’s not going anywhere. She and the
rest of the city council are part of the “Good Ol Boys” club. 
But there is one
saving Grace in Chesapeake and that is City Council Member Robert C. Ike, Jr (http://bit.ly/1H1Sxsq). He’ll meet with you,
even make you feel as he cares and empathizes with the plight of the animals in
Chesapeake. But, that’s as far as it goes. He’s would make a damn good actor if
he ever wanted to change careers.
Oh yeah, I said I would get back to the shelter. Kathy Strouse is the
Superintendent of the shelter. “Superintendent” the title alone tells you how
archaic and stuck in the dark ages Chesapeake Animal Control is. The only way I
can describe Kathy is bitter. To this day she is still bitter about the fact
that she did not get to kill a St. Bernard named Alchemy. And try she did.
But
she lost in court and he was awarded to an
organization that takes very good
care of him. To this day he is doing wonderful. Kathy comes down from her
office and looks for reasons to euthanize a dog, especially if it’s a Pit. She
has made it pretty clear that she doesn’t like them, doesn’t trust them and
doesn’t find any reason for them to exist. Oddly enough though, she was quick
to write a book about the Michael Vick dog fighting ring of a few years ago
now. Before you say, she wrote a book about Pits and can’t be all that bad. The
book was from a legal standpoint where she said in the book that the dogs
should all be euthanized, even though many of them went on to be wonderful
ambassadors for their breed. So Kathy released her book, trying to make money
off of the Pits, just like a backyard breeder would make money off of them. For
years and years Kathy kicked and screamed about opening the shelter on Sunday
(the second biggest adoption day of the week) but in June 2014 the shelter
hours for Sunday were changed to noon – 4:00pm. I just have to wonder if it had
to do with all the noise that Chesapeake citizens were making. Maybe it was a
way to give them something and shut them up?
So, what does a woman being served a summons for feeding
stray cats on private property have to do with the Mayor, Police Chief, City
Council and Head of the shelter? They are the ones who are supposed to be
protecting Chesapeake’s animals but as long as each of them holds their current
position that is not going to happen. And exactly why was a CHESAPEAKE Police
Officer and Animal Control officer waiting at Debbie Manzione’s home in
SUFFOLK? As usual, Chesapeake police spokeswoman Kelly O'Sullivan offered few
details. And what in the world was a Chesapeake Animal Control officer doing on
PRIVATE property if the property owner never called to make a complaint? At
some point Animal Control Officer set up live-capture traps baited with food -
but because they say other people were feeding the cats, the traps were
unsuccessful. So Debbie Manzione was being part of the solution by taking the
cats she could to a vet to have them spayed/neutered and vaccinated. But
instead of getting a thank you by anyone from the city of Chesapeake, she now
gets to go to court and answer for the charges.
In closing, I want to make sure that you understand that there are some Animal Control Officers who truly care about the animals and do everything they can to help them. Unfortunately, many times it results in them hitting a brick wall.
This is Chesapeake, Virginia.
