More than a month after the board of the Charlottesville Albemarle SPCA announced an independent investigation into allegations of a hostile work environment and concerning conditions for the animals, a former staff member says no one she knows has been contacted by McGuire Woods, the law firm conducting the investigation. 

“We’re still waiting for them to reach out to us,” says former SPCA staffer Katie Roche, one of more than 100 former shelter staffers and volunteers who have signed their names to public statements expressing alarm.

In addition to the independent investigation currently underway, the Virginia Department of Agriculture conducted an unannounced inspection of the shelter in mid-February and found multiple repeat non-critical violations. Another high-level shelter staffer has resigned citing toxic leadership, according to the CASPCA Concerns Facebook page, and a former volunteer dog-walker says she was fired from her position in 2019 after expressing her concerns about conditions at the shelter to management.

“I had raised concerns over a long period of time according to the chain of command that we as volunteers were told to adhere to,” says Kristin Swenson, a professor of religious studies at VCU who volunteered as a dog walker between 2015 and 2019. Swenson, who shared her experience on Charlottesville Right Now, says she was fired from the volunteer position after she voiced concerns. She then wrote a letter to the board after learning about standards of care established by the Association of Shelter Veterinarians. 

“I saw the very clear ways in which our shelter was violating those things,” she says. “And I thought, well, this is a wonderful resource. I’ll bring it to leadership and say, look, we have these standards of care. Can we rethink the ways that we are managing our animals here?”

She got a response saying her letter had been received and never heard anything else from the board.

While Swenson says she witnessed critical violations during her tenure including overcrowding and animals kept in feces-filled crates, a recent inspection by the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services found only repeat non-critical violations of animal custody records. According to the Feb.15 report, some animals brought in from out-of-state were not included in a January 2022 Animal Custody Records Summary report and certain elements including breed description were missing.

Roche says those findings are encouraging.

“I can only speak to what I saw when I was there,” says Roche, who left in July 2021.” If they didn’t find what I saw, that’s great. When I left, there were still dogs living in crates in the basement.”

The most recent high-level staffer to leave is the now former director of staff development, who submitted her resignation in February after holding the position for less than six months. That staffer “quickly found that any real progress was unlikely, as efforts to gain momentum were undermined on a regular basis by shelter leadership,” according to a press release from the CASPCA Concerns group.

McGuire Woods has not responded to a request for comment on the status of the investigation.

An emailed statement from the CASPCA board referenced the ongoing investigation. “We are eager to analyze the results of the review and take the necessary steps to improve our organization,” it reads. The statement also notes that the Department of Agrigulture inspection found no violations relating to animal care or neglect.

The board also cited its record-setting placement of 3,806 dogs into homes in 2022, a figure that translates to a 98 percent “live release rate.”

“These numbers are the direct result of our commitment to reducing euthanasia of healthy and treatable companion animals under the nationally recognized Asilomor Accords,” the statement says. “We are committed to the protection, wellbeing, and safety of all animals under our care.”

Since CASPCA functions as the public shelter for both Albemarle and Charlottesville and receives $1 million in public funding, Swenson believes the localities should each have a representative on the shelter board. 

“At my own personal expense—in time and energy, emotionally, psychologically—I spoke up then, and am now again simply because I want our CASPCA to succeed as a healthy organization, to care well for animals and the people that serve them,” she says. “Present leadership has undermined that basic goal over and over again over a long period of time. Under the circumstances, I believe that the executive director must go. And the board of directors, due an overhaul, must operate with transparency and public input.”