Lost doggie found and returned
Published: November 16, 2005
Sasha is back home, safe and sound, thanks to the efforts of two Jersey City good Samaritans.
The Italian mini greyhound ran away last week from a private unlicensed kennel in Bayonne. The dog’s owners, Joseph Kuleszynski and Melanie Constantino, discovered Sasha had somehow escaped when they called from South Carolina on Sunday morning to ask if he was doing OK.
A raft of city inspectors yesterday visited the kennel, on Avenue A between Juliette Terrace and Gertrude Street, and talked to the operators, Ray Puggi and Linda Rowland.
The kennel may stay open pending a final decision expected today, city officials said.
The kennel has no certificate of occupancy, nor a license to operate as a kennel, city officials said. Yesterday, City Zoning Officer John Zgola inspected the kennel and said the owners didn’t have a work permit for some electrical work done on a heating and ventilating unit.
Despite its problems, the kennel got rave reviews yesterday, from Dolores Szemple, who is licensed by the city to take in poodles at her West Fifth Street site, and from Pamela Linquist, president of Companion Animal Rescue & Education (CARE), a local animal advocacy group. Both said they had no problems recommending the place for boarding animals.
Board N Tails has 10 dogs in individual cages in a large back room and 15 cats in an adjoining smaller room.
The kennel’s operators said Sasha escaped about 4 p.m. Saturday from a living room space, which separates the office from the back room, jumping off the arm of a couch and over a portable gate and into the office. At that moment, Rowland said, a customer opened the front door and the dog bolted out.
“Ray chased him down Avenue A to Third Street but by then he’d vanished into thin air,” Rowland said.
“We were out all weekend - until 6 in the morning - posting fliers and looking,” she said. “We took shifts.”
Employees told Kuleszynski on Sunday that they couldn’t call them immediately because they’d lost their contact information.
Peter Rabatt, a 16-year-old junior at Dickinson High School, found the dog on Kennedy Boulevard between First and Second streets and took him home.
Rabatt said he was going to keep the dog, but a neighbor, Bernard Mills, convinced him to call police and see if he belonged to anyone.
Bayonne police recognized the dog’s description from yesterday’s story in The Jersey Journal and called Sasha’s owners. They were reunited yesterday afternoon.
“We rushed over there and we started calling Sasha’s name because we still weren’t sure if it was him, and Sasha came to a second-floor window, pressed his nose on the glass and was crying,” Kuleszynski said.
“I’m glad it’s finally over with now,” Rowland said. “A happy ending.”
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