Senator Henry Stern Gives Award to CAPS’ President for the Nonprofit’s Many Successes
On June 28, 2024, California State Senator Henry Stern honored CAPS President Deborah Howard as a Senate District 27 Woman of the Year. She was one of 19 women chosen from 1500 nominations and the only one who does national work. This impressive group of women is now holding monthly Zoom meetings to help one another with initiatives. Some of the women run nonprofits that do political work, such as for climate change, and have offered to help CAPS with state animal legislation.
Sen. Stern, is the first millennial elected to the California Senate. His district goes from Thousand Oaks, where CAPS is located, to Sherman Oaks, where Deborah grew up with actor parents. He is the son of actor Daniel Stern, who was one of the burglars in Home Alone and was the voice of the adult Kevin in The Wonder Years.
At the four-hour event, Sen. Stern gave a speech about each honored woman before she spoke. Deborah presented Sen Stern with a CAPS cap. Afterwards, Senator Stern told Deborah that he is “up for a fight” and wants to sponsor CAPS’ shelter reform legislator. CAPS is joining with recently formed groups, composed of rescues and animal advocates, to go up against the California Animal Welfare Association (CalAnimals), the powerful lobbying organization representing all of the shelters in the state.
CalAnimals’ members include private wealthy shelters like San Francisco SPCA and Humane Society of Silicon Valley, underfunded municipal facilities , such as Kern County Animal Services (KCAS) and Devore Animal Shelter (San Bernardino County), and mismanaged but adequately funded municipal shelters, such as Los Angeles Animal Services, Orange County Animal Care, and San Jose Animal Care. CalAnimals, which works arduously to defeat legislation affecting shelters, refunded CAPS’ affiliate membership fee after we complained about inhumane conditions at KCAS and Devore.
Senator Stern is also going to help CAPS reach state legislators representing Kern County so we can obtain funding for an animal cruelty task force. Assemblymember Miguel Santiago’s legislative director has already provided contact information for legislative directors working for senators and assemblymembers representing Kern County.
You can learn more about CAPS’ shelter reform efforts in California, see the trailer for our upcoming documentary, The Crisis at California’s Municipal Shelters, and donate to help with the funding for this documentary here
