After more than a decade with the SPCA, Corinne Fong steps into a bigger role as executive director
nicholas yong Straits Times 1 Aug 11;
Corinne Fong's first role with the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was 'picking up poop' as a kennel volunteer, she recalls with a laugh.
More than 11 years on, the 47-year-old today steps into a much bigger role with Singapore's oldest animal charity - that of executive director.
Ms Fong, who also serves as an animal adoption counsellor with the SPCA, succeeds Ms Deirdre Moss, 59, who held the position for 27 years. She was unanimously selected by the SPCA's management committee, with whom she has served three terms.
Speaking to Life! at her condominium in Ang Mo Kio, with her English cocker spaniel Dewey sitting at her feet, Ms Fong is quick to stress that it was not an 'incestuous' process. Newspaper advertisements were placed inviting applications for the position, and like all candidates, she had to go for a job interview.
Ms Fong, who is single, freely admits that she is still adjusting to being in the limelight and calls media interviews 'nerve-racking'. Perhaps sensing her apprehension, both Dewey and her cat Scat, a stray rescued from a drain, sniff this reporter curiously.
Ms Fong left her job as a financial adviser to take on her new role. She declines to discuss if she is taking a pay cut or how much her salary will be.
Among her immediate priorities - increasing fund-raising activities and attracting and retaining volunteers. This is because the SPCA will be moving to a new 0.8ha site in Sungei Tengah, off Lim Chu Kang Road in 2014.
'It takes a little over a million dollars a year to run our current premises. We've been given a plot of land twice the size of the current one, so by simple mathematics, maybe we will need two times the amount to fund the operation,' notes Ms Fong.
The SPCA relies on membership dues and the goodwill of donors to fund its operations. It does not receive government funding. Its current premises can house about 180 animals and it has about 600 individual and corporate volunteers.
With increasing affluence and a corresponding rise in the number of pet owners as well as abandoned pets, Ms Fong is anticipating a greater demand for the services of organisations such as the SPCA.
She says: 'When we move into the new premises, the public and the members are rightly going to expect more facilities and more services, so we need more people to run those various areas.'
While she sees the proliferation of organisations such as Action For Singapore Dogs and the Cat Welfare Society as 'natural progress', Ms Fong is looking to form stronger alliances with such groups.
'No one organisation can run the show. Animal welfare is a huge problem in Singapore, and the more alliances we have, the better the voice.
'Right now, it's so fragmented, maybe the Government is saying, okay fine, let these little guys go and sort it out. But if we come as a voice, I think the Government is bound to have to listen to us.'
Also on Ms Fong's agenda - proposing to the Education Ministry that an animal welfare curriculum be worked into a civics programme for young children as part of efforts to combat animal abuse.
Figures from the SPCA show that reports of cruelty to animals last year rose 15 per cent from the previous year's, to 987 alleged cases.
'There should be higher fines and jail terms. A lot of people are getting away with just slaps on the wrists,' she says. The maximum penalty for animal cruelty is a fine of $10,000 and a jail term of one year.
When asked if animal abusers should be caned, as suggested by some animal-rights activists, she is more ambivalent.
She says: 'That would depend on the offence and the degree of brutality involved. If it fits the crime, it should be implemented, but that's up to the courts to decide.'
Ms Fong is also hoping for changes in official policies towards animals. For example, owners of Housing Board flats are currently not allowed to keep cats and each unit can keep only one dog of an approved small breed a unit.
'You have stray cats not being culled but kept alive, then you have town councils who are answerable to their residents on the cleanliness and maintenance of the estates, but where will all these cats go if they are not being allowed to be housed in HDB flats? I hope the HDB will come out and make its stand clear.'
Ms Fong adds that the restrictions on dogs make it difficult to find new owners for medium-sized and large dogs who have been abandoned or given up, as they can be re-housed only in condominiums and private homes.
An inter-agency task force, which includes senior officials from the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority and HDB, is currently reviewing pet ownership and stray animal management policies, including the restrictions on pets in HDB flats.
Ms Fong appears bemused when asked if she has a mission statement.
'There's no mind-blowing statement. I'm just going to go in and do the job that Deirdre started, and hopefully raise the consciousness of the Singaporean public that it needs to have the basic human decency towards animals.'
