This is the 1991 HSUS Report of the President, presented by John Hoyt at the Annual Membership Meeting in Washington, DC. Hoyt claims that HSUS is separate from the animal rights movement that developed in the 1980s, writing: "the lines between animal protection groups such as The HSUS and animal rights groups such as PETA are being more clearly drawn and less frequently cross." Hoyt, however, later states that "[t]his is not to say that the rights of animals should be either ignored or minimized as a meaningful and vital philosophy. Indeed, it must not be."

Hoyt also states that he wishes HSUS to formally promote the message of eating less meat. He quotes from his April 1990 Earth Day speech, in which he said "Planet Earth is dying, and it is we, the people, who are hastening her demise."

The Report also includes passages from:

• Patricia Forkan, Senior Vice President
• Phyllis Wright, VP-Companion Animals
• Randall Lockwood, VP-Field Services
• David Wills, VP-Investigations
• Michael Fox, VP-Farm Animals and Bioethics
• John Grandy, VP-Wildlife and Habitat Protection
• Jan Hartke, VP-Environment
• Patty Finch, VP-Youth Education
• Roger Kindler-- Office of the General Counsel
• Michael Fox, Director of the Center for Respect of Life and Environment

This document is courtesy of the University of Illinois Archives/Harold D. Guither papers.

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This document, a legal-size mailer from the Humane Society of the United States, is titled "A Discussion ... Rights For Animals." It was produced and printed in 1990. A fundraising-disclosure disclaimer that only applies to West Virginia donors may suggest that this version was only sent out to HSUS's mailing list in that state.

This piece begins with a revelation that may startle 21st-Century readers who are accustomed to seeing HSUS distance itself from the divisive language of "animal rights": 

The Humane Society of the United States has long been in the forefront of advocating the recognition of rights of and for animals. At its national membership conference held in San Francisco in 1980, the membership of The HSUS formally resolved to "pursue on all fronts ... the clear articulation and establishment of the rights of all animals ... within the full range of American life and culture."

The two-page treatise, unusual for a fundraising mailer in its philosophical long-windedness, mainly argues that "animal rights" means including animals "within the same system of moral protections that govern our behavior toward each other."

In particular, the fundraising mailer emphasizes the need for animals to have legal standing in courts of law:

[Animals] are viewed as having no inherent capacity to invoke the protection of the state, and their entire legal status is underpinned by constitutional doctrines that deny them recognition as "persons."

Access to the courts is such a powerful right and would pose so revolutionary a threat to the established order that it will probably be among the last of animal rights to be recognized, requiring statutory, even constitutional, changes.

The author writes that animals should enjoy the legal right of having "third parties" sue on their behalf. "The critical goal," HSUS explains, is "getting litigation into a format where someone with ready access to the judicial system is representing the animal and its interests and only the animal and its interests."

Predictably, the leaflet ends with a request for money, promising that "Money donated is put into action on the front line right away. The animals need us now."

This document is reproduced through the courtesy of the University of Illinois Archives (Harold D. Guither Papers, 1977-2001) 

This map, from page 20 of the HSUS-published 2011 Shelter Pages, shows the names of all of the Humane Society of the United States "State Directors" as of press time.

State Directors are generally HSUS's chief lobbying coordinators and press spokespersons for state-level issues.

The map shows that HSUS has Directors in 40 of the 50 states. At the time of this writing, the organization was also actively seeking to hire directors for three more (Nevada, Kansas, and Alaska). HSUS has also had a Rhode Island State Director in the past.

The states that appear to be of less concern to HSUS include Utah, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Carolina, Maryland, and Connecticut.

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This PDF contains a 98-page report from the "Shelter Evaluation Services" department of the Humane Society of the United States. It was delivered to the city of Carson City, Nevada, during November 2010. The local Nevada Appeal newspaper first reported on its findings on December 30, 2010.

According to the Appeal, the city's Health and Human Services Department, which oversees Animal Services, requested the evaluation last spring. The report is based on a three-day site visit conducted in July to tour the shelter's current operations, services, and programs. HSUS charges $25,000 for such evaluations.

The report criticizes the Carson City Animal Services (CCAS) facility for not watering its lawn; causing stray, feral, and otherwise unsocialized cats elevated stress levels through improper housing; insufficient housing for exotic animals, birds, and small mammals; "a complete absence of nurturing animal care and animal enrichment programs"; inadequate animal-handling training for staff members; flawed communication with off-site veterinarians; limited usable animal-housing space; and unhygienic cleaning practices. HSUS also recommended that CCAS "contact local teachers who may be interested in receiving KIND News," a monthly publication put out by HSUS's youth-education division.

The Carson City Board of Supervisors moved to accept most of HSUS's recommendations on December 7, 2010, shy of building a new facility.

“We asked for this to get an idea of how we're doing compared to other communities and to find out if we can be doing better,” Gail Radtke, Carson City's animal-services manager, told the Appeal.

However, given that the evaluation was based on a very short visit to the Carson City facilities and that HSUS doesn't operate or oversee any shelter of its own, it's unclear why the city paid HSUS for the report, especially amid a statewide budget deficit of up to $3 billion. The super-rich HSUS has yet to explain publicly why it shouldn't be providing evaluation reports like this one for free.

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This PDF contains a 122-page report from the "Shelter Evaluation Services" department of the Humane Society of the United States. It was delivered to the city of Dallas, Texas during November 2010. The exact date is unknown, but The Dallas Morning News leaked a copy online on November 29. 

The report itself was commissioned in December 2009 by Dallas Animal Services, which agreed to pay HSUS $25,000 for the evaluation. HSUS staff spent three days on-site in April 2010, basing their report on their observations in this very short period of time. HSUS reportedly prepared a similarly expensive report for the same organization in 2001.

The actual funds for the report's completion were provided by an organization called the Metroplex Animal Coalition (MAC), which describes itself as being "focused on spay and neuter assistance ONLY" (as opposed to live-animal adoptions). However, since MAC's money comes from dues paid by member groups, and most of its members are themselves animal shelters, it stands to reason that the HSUS report was funded (however indirectly) by private shelters that HSUS should be financially supporting—not the other way around. MAC's Advisory Board includes one member (out of five) who works for HSUS. Its Secretary/Treasurer chaired a 2010 Dallas fundraising gala for HSUS. 

The report itself criticizes Dallas Animal Services for the way it cares for cats; the lack of stimulation and exercise its dogs receive; flawed communication with veterinarians; a lack of hygienic animal handling; a failure to provide significant space to care for horses and other livestock; and a feeling of "alienation" among its staff. HSUS also complained about how the Dallas City Council, whose interests lie in getting animals off the streets, crosses swords with the animal shelter management's goal of reducing the number of animals that are euthanized every year.

Contained on the report's last page, as a way to establish HSUS's bona fides, is the false claim that HSUS is "backed by 11 million Americans, or one in every 28."

The super-rich HSUS has yet to explain publicly why it shouldn't be providing evaluation reports like this one for free.

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2009. It contains a message from president Wayne Pacelle to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

2009 highlights included 121 state laws enacted to regulate animal treatment, a European Union ban on commercial seal products from Canada, undercover investigations at a cattle ranch and a medical research lab, an expansion of the End Dogfighting program in Atlanta, protests against commercial dog breeding operations, a program to protect wildlife from hunters, and broadening the reach of Humane Society International.

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2008. It contains a message from president Wayne Pacelle to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

Highlights included details of the HSUS-backed Proposition 2 to force Californian egg farmers to redesign their facilities or close their doors, acquiring undercover video from a cattle ranch, a state law enacted in Massachusetts to ban greyhound racing, distribution of HSUS's KIND News publication to nearly 1 million elementary schoolchildren, and $3.5 million spent on an animal-care initiative in the Gulf Coast inspired by Hurricane Katrina (despite raising $34 million for rescue activities in 2005).

The 2008 annual report listed a total of 470 employees -- nearly double the size of HSUS's staff in 2001.

On page 16, HSUS claims to have "cared for" more than 70,000 animals during 2008. But nearly 33,000 of these were dogs and cats that were spayed or neutered in conjunction with HSUS's "Spay Day," a promotion that saw HSUS supporting pet shelters in nominal amounts to do the surgeries. (Neither HSUS nor any of its affiliates ever actually "cared for" these pets.) 

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2007. It contains a message from president Wayne Pacelle to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

Programs in 2007 included a merger with the Association of Veterinarians for Animal Rights to create the Humane Society Veterinary Medical Association, the enactment of a federal law to make animal fighting a felony, lobbying food makers to source their food from more "humane" farms, fighting fur production in Canada and China, and gearing up for the "Proposition 2" battle to ban conventional housing for egg-laying hens in California.

In the "HSUS by the Numbers" section, HSUS claimed 10,571,955 "members and constituents," 15 completed "covert investigations," and $6.8 million in grants to animal-care organizations (out of $120.6 million in revenue).

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2006. It contains a message from president Wayne Pacelle to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

Lists of major donors and all mentions of HSUS's signature "Pets for Life" program were excluded from the 2006 annual report. Programs that were highlighted included a successful ballot initiative in Arizona to ban the use of gestation crates for pigs, legal petitions at the federal level filed by the HSUS Animal Protection Litigation team (now in its second year), legislation targeting commercial dog and cat breeding operations, efforts to ban whaling in Japan, and a merger with the Doris Day Animal League.

The 2006 annual report notes that HSUS's employee roster has expanded to "more than 400."

This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2005. It contains a message from president Wayne Pacelle to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, a list of major donors, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

Following the 2004 merger with the Fund for Animals (FFA), HSUS and FFA jointly launched a variety of programs to attack the fur industry, hunting organizations, large-scale livestock farming, and animal fighting. Other programs include the "No Battery Eggs" campaign to regulate egg farmers, the "Protect Seals" campaign to protest seal hunting in Canada, and the founding of the Humane Society Legislative Fund.

The 2005 HSUS annual report also contains a special section on HSUS recovery efforts after Hurricane Katrina.

HSUS removed this document from its website in October 2010.

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2004. It contains a message from president Wayne Pacelle to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

The 2004 annual report noted the merger between HSUS and the Fund for Animals. HSUS programs that year included the second annual "Design Against Fur" competition, testimony to prohibit the use of elephants in circuses, lobbying efforts at both the state and federal level, and the publication of its "Manure Money Pit" report on large-scale livestock farming. 2004 also marked the 50th anniversary of HSUS.

HSUS removed this document from its website in October 2010.

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2003. It contains a message from newly appointed president Wayne Pacelle to HSUS supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, a list of major donors, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

HSUS's 2003 annual report placed special emphasis on HSUS's "Halt Hog Factories" program, its efforts to lobby on Capitol Hill, and its media penetration in print and on television.

HSUS removed this document from its website in October 2010.

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2002. It contains a message from then-president Paul Irwin to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, a list of major donors, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

The 2002 HSUS annual report put a special focus on its "Shelter Partners" pet-adoption program, wildlife rehabilitation, and a message from Gretchen Wyler, whose organization the Ark Trust became The HSUS Hollywood Office in 2002.

HSUS removed this document from its website in October 2010.

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in 2001. It contains a message from then-president Paul Irwin to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

It also describes a new strategic plan "using September 11 as a sea change catalyst," and announces the launch of HSUS Signature Programs like "Pets for Life" and "Living With Wildlife." Irwin notes that HSUS employs "more than 250" staff members at this point in time.

HSUS removed this document from its website in October 2010.

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This is the annual report that HSUS published to describe its program priorities in the year 2000. It contains a message from then-president Paul Irwin to supporters, testimonials from a selection of HSUS employees, and a summary of its program accomplishments and consolidated financial data.

The 2000 annual report's highlights included a review of the newly expanded "Pets for Life" campaign, the "Kindred Spirits" memorial program for people who have lost their pets, scenes from "National Farm Animals Awareness Week," and a section titled "We Don't Run Shelters, We Help Shelters Run Better."

HSUS removed this document from its website in October 2010.

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