Month: December 2010

Two weak puppies sat on a couch on the front porch that spanned the length of the Southwestern-style, one-story home, struggling to keep their heads upright.

On an adjacent couch, flies swooped over the body of a dead puppy.

Welcome to an area south of Tucson near Old Vail Connection Road and the Old Nogales Highway, a place some people call “Dogpatch.” It’s an area where small houses and trailers on dirt roads spread across the desert, and where residents own a lot of animals.

It’s also a place some people come to abandon animals they no longer want – or dump carcasses.

“Dogpatch is an area that we’ve known about for a long time,” said Jayne Cundy, public service supervisor for Pima Animal Care Center. “It’s an area where dogs are known to wander and animals are abandoned there.”

The rescue group Angels for Animals of Tucson has been going to Dogpatch on weekends for the past year to rescue dogs. Nancy Maddry started the nonprofit rescue group in December 2009 when it became evident there was a need to rescue abused and abandoned animals in the area.

Ever since his son was diagnosed with schizophrenia at the age of 16, H. Clarke Romans has made it his life’s mission to break down the stigma surrounding mental illness.

And Romans, director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness of Southern Arizona, was furious when the state cut funds this year for seriously mentally ill people, limiting many of the services available to them.

The budget cuts passed July 1 have meant that seriously mentally ill people who do not meet state Title XIX requirements for reimbursable services started losing funding.

The cuts meant that anyone who does not qualify for Medicaid also does not qualify for aid. Now, these people are state-sanctioned only for generic medication and some crisis services.

Previously, seriously mentally ill patients were provided name-brand medication, therapeutic services and in extreme cases, housing.

Ask Teresa Leal what she thinks of herself, and she’ll say she’s hyperactive and disciplined.

The Sonora native who lives on the Mexican side of Nogales will also say she’s a warrior.

And the 60-year-old curator and educator at the Pimeria Alta Historical Society in Nogales, Ariz., adds that she has no plans to slow down.

“I’m busy and hopefully productive, but the times are serious enough for all of us to try anything,” she says.

Leal is an active member of her community on environment and health issues, and she’s now planning her next project, in which she will work with the Binational Health Councils to examine community health issues on both sides of the border.

No doubt she’ll pull it off. There’s a certain warrior fierceness about the petite woman with a tightly cropped pixie cut who moves from a hearty chuckle to a down-to-business attitude with ease.