The Mammalian Daily

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Budget preview: “The budget is a very hard needle to thread.”

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2016 Budget

Today is Budget Day in The Park

Will she or won’t she? And, will she or won’t she what?[pullquote]The  budget is a very hard needle to thread. Agreement on the allocation of funds can never be one hundred per cent. My own hope is that PFO head Valentina Abeja will learn from the past, but look to the future.—Magnus P. Marmoset, holder of the Simian Chair in Political Philosophy at the University of West Terrier[/pullquote]

Those are just a couple of the questions on the minds of all engaged Park citizens, as we await the presentation of the Park Expense Projections for 2016 (The Park Finance Office’s formal name for the budget).

PFO head Valentina Abeja will present the budget to the Archons at four o’clock this afternoon and she has scheduled a press conference immediately following the presentation.

This will be Abeja’s first budget and many financial, social, and health experts have weighed in on what they believe should be included in the budget. The Mammalian Daily recently spoke to some of them about their hopes now that budget day is here. Below are their responses (Please note: responses have been edited due to space limitations):

Aintza Kanariar, Director of Public Relations, Department of Holidays, Festivals, and Celebrations: “I’m hoping for at least the same level of support that we’ve had in the past. Our celebrations are a fundamental part of Park life.”

Wellington Whistlepig, president, Park Association of Shops and Services (PASS): “It may be too much to hope for, but we could use some official support, even one percent of the budget. We’ve been supporting The Park through tough times for years and an acknowledgement of that fact would go a long way.”

Kalliope Sun Bear, president, Weather Makers, Producers and Sellers Alliance of The Park (WMPSAP): “We made a number of presentations to the new PFO head and we felt she was receptive to what we were saying. I have every confidence that she will abide by some of our suggestions—in particular, that the Weather Office purchase weather produced by Park manufacturers.”

A.P. Civet, president, Society of Concerned Park Cultivators, Planters, Growers, and Farmers (SCPCPGF): “We’ve found the new PFO head to be quite thoughtful and willing to listen. I believe she understands our situation better than those who’ve held her job previously. Food production is fundamental to our life here. We are quite optimistic about the new budget.”

Hermione Hippo, head nurse, Park Hospital for the Afflicted and Infirm, assistant professor, UWT School of Medicine: “For the last while, ‘health’ has been subsumed under the category of  ‘residents’ requirements’ and, as a result, I don’t believe it has been properly supported. Health issues—physical, mental and emotional—are a big part of our lives here and require not only treatment and support, but research funding. I hope the new PFO head understands that.”

Inez Gallina, president of the refugee aid group Home to Roost: “Apart from our autochthonous citizens, The Park’s population has historically been made up of immigrants and refugees. With our open immigration policy, the funding requirements grow every year. I hope Valentina Abeja fully understands that fact and respects the work of all of us in immigrant and refugee aid. I realize that funds are limited, but we cannot in all conscience or practicality invite Animals to make The Park their home if we offer them no assistance.”

Gareth Shepherd, president, Federation of Canine Security Workers (FCSW): “Security has become more of an issue the past few years and while we have always supplemented a paid force with volunteers such as the Doves—and now Does— of Peace, we still require more of the budget than we have been receiving. I hope the new PFO head values peace and security as much as other Park citizens do.”

Magnus P. Marmoset, holder of the Simian Chair in Political Philosophy at the University of West Terrier: “The  budget is a very hard needle to thread. Agreement on the allocation of funds can never be one hundred per cent. We all have different hopes and dreams and priorities. My own hope is that PFO head Valentina Abeja will learn from the past, but look to the future.”

Fur flies at UWT journalism conference

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UWT COATThe fur was flying this past weekend as The University of West Terrier’s Cuthbert School of Journalism hosted the largest print media conference in Park history.

Virtually all print media organizations and associations were represented at the conference, which was jointly chaired by the Cuthbert School’s dean, Gertrude C. Owl, and journalism professor Ludwiga Saimiri, the former director of the Centre for the Incorporation and Integration of Interspecial Values in Journalism (CIIIVJ).

Attendees pinpointed a baker’s dozen of hot button issues, ranging from ensuring fair coverage, recognizing equality of species, maintaining journalistic integrity, and finding new tools for recruiting the young, to financial issues, opening up new revenue streams, and more. But most agreed that the number one issue at this year’s conference was transparency. And, in that respect, The Mammalian Daily came in for some heavy criticism, particularly from the Association of Non-Mammalian Park Newspapers (ANMPN).

Nathan R. DiPressa, Editor-in-Chief of The Reptile Register and the Association’s Executive Director, spoke at length about the need for Park newspapers to be transparent in their coverage and asserted that certain major outlets had failed miserably in that regard. As an example, he cited The Mammalian Daily, whose reporters have been working, as he called it, “undercover in plain sight.”

“The era of anonymous reporting is over,” DiPressa declared. “If you are hiding your journalists’ identities, you are hiding their biases, and you are not being forthright with your readers. We can smell your fear [of transparency] and it is turning us off reading your newspaper,” he declared.

Priscilla Weevil, Editor-in-Chief of The Serangga Star Adviser, not only agreed with DiPressa, but went further by issuing a challenge to The Mammalian Daily:

“We call on you to open up and start including the names of your reporters in your bylines by the beginning of 2016. We can think of no valid reason to obscure them.”

Although Mammalian Daily managing editor Orphea Haas was in attendance, she declined to comment on the accusations, nor has she given any indication that she will consider adding names to TMD bylines.

The conference wrapped up late Sunday night with a celebratory dinner at which both Owl and Saimiri spoke candidly about the practice of journalism in The Park.

“This has never been an easy profession and it is not an easy one now, but I know no journalist who would not say that the rewards far outweigh the challenges,” said Saimiri.

Majority of new Park jobs are in field of security, law: Department of Statistics

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Clam Security Guard

The majority of new Park jobs are in security and law, statistics say

The majority of The Park’s newly-created jobs lie in the fields of security and law, says a new report released today by the Department of Statistics and Records.[pullquote]These types of service jobs–parapolicing, for example—are creating a false impression that life in The Park is dangerous. That impression could become a destabilizing force and…lead to the need for these jobs.—Dr. Anneliese Cissa, Livingstone School of Economics and Social Science, UWT[/pullquote]

The report, which is known as, “Statistics Related to Job Creation in The Park: 2014,” is the latest in a series of reports that have been commissioned annually since 2007 by the sitting Archons.

The state of employment as depicted in the report is troubling in many ways, says Dr. Anneliese Cissa, head of the Livingstone School of Economics and Social Science at the University of West Terrier. Dr. Cissa, who has written extensively about the Park’s economy and its effect on employment, says this latest report shows concrete evidence that we are “spinning” in terms of high level job creation.

“This report shows that The Park is not just failing to generate new, high level jobs; it is still creating too high a number of service jobs. But even more than that, these types of service jobs–parapolicing, for example—are creating a false impression that life in The Park is dangerous. That impression could become a destabilizing force and could, in turn, lead to the need for these jobs,” she says.

According to Dr. Cissa, nothing has changed significantly since she wrote the report, “Seeking Greener Pastures: The Exodus of the Unwilling and Able,” in 2012. At that time, she warned that The Park was not generating sufficient jobs to keep the skilled and most diligent among us from leaving to seek employment elsewhere. Now, she says, the situation has become even more dire.

“We must allocate funds in the new budget for high level job creation. Otherwise, we will have nothing of substance to offer our young.”

PIFF 2015 sneak peek: Noon Nuttiness

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Park Interspecial Film FestivalThe Park Interspecial Film Festival (PIFF) may be many weeks away, but today, at least, we got a sneak peek at what’s going to tickle our funny bones come October.

At a short press conference this morning, PIFF Communications President Leola Ocelot announced three of the films that will screen during the Noon Nuttiness portion of PIFF 2015:

SEARCHING FOR THE SPITMAN: A JOURNEY THROUGH FOAM, FROTH, AND FUN
Directed by Ernesto Santiago Camello
The Park | 23 minutes | Noon Nuttiness Première

We’re all familiar with our friend Stan the Spitman’s signature phrase, “Spitballs from Heaven!” Yet how much do we know about the Spitman, himself?

Not a lot, as it turns out. But writer and director Ernesto Santiago Camello has set out to change all that in this alarmingly candid short film about one of The Park’s funniest citizens engaged in one of the world’s oldest professions: spitmaking.

WOODRUFF DALMATIO: FINE LINES AND WRINKLES
Directed by Ludmilla Ptak
The Park | 26 minutes | Noon Nuttiness Première

Not just a hastily put together version of his award-winning book of the same name, but a film that shows the outrageous Dalmatio at work and at play, which for him appears to be the same thing.

NOT FOR POLITICAL PORPOISES
Directed by Cong Da Jiāngtún
The Park | 35 minutes | Noon Nuttiness Première

It takes a certain kind of mind to create humour out of adversity, and there’s no doubt Cong Da Jiāngtún has it.

Jiāngtún, whose own species is endangered, has written and directed this “tour of the everyday life of the almost extinct.”

“Life on the out and out,” he says in the film, “can be extraordinarily amusing.”

The Park Interspecial Film Festival runs 1-5 October 2015.

Glass shape made of nuts with strawNoon Nuttiness gratefully acknowledges the support of The Nut Bar, the most trusted nut shop in The Park.

Archons’ office hires full-time consultant to build legacy: rumour

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headsNtales

Gossip site headsNtales says the Archons have hired an image consultant

Only halfway through their term but with their eyes on the future, the 2015 Archons appear to have engaged the services of a full-time legacy consultant.

The Park’s “most-watched gossip web site,” headsNtales, is reporting that an agent representing the Office of the Archons had a series of meetings in June with the Maidali Margay Consulting Group. These meetings, according to the web site, resulted in the signing of a comprehensive contract for services to represent the 2015 Archons and “all Archons in perpetuity.”

In a preamble to the post, the site’s co-founder Hortencia Guacamayo writes, “We are going on the record with this and the reason is that, in our opinion, this is a despicable move on the part of the Archons and we believe that all Park Animals should know about it and protest the use of funds for such a purpose. The way to be commended for your work is to do a good job, not to hire a company to say that you have done a good job.”

The Maidali Margay Group assists individuals and companies in rehabilitating their image and making themselves more palatable to a disenchanted public. The company is perhaps best known for working with beleaguered radio talk show host Yannis Tavros after he insulted Hieronymous Hedgehog and his uncle, the late Archon Hamlin Jarvis Lambert Hedgehog. Following Tavros’s suspension from Toro Talk Radio, a consultant from the group engineered his comeback by rallying his supporters and arranging his “snout to snout” on-air summit with Hieronymous. The group’s other clients have included deposed Park Finance Officer Milton Struts, the Monotreme Savings Bank (MSB), and Fannia di Volo, editor-in-chief of the Insect Intelligencer (subsequently renamed the Serangga Star Adviser).

Mark your calendars: August 18 is Budget Day in The Park

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august 18Some say they should make it a Park-wide holiday while others say they fear the worst: that the new PFO head will do as bad a job (or worse) as Milton Struts did in his final budget.

Nevertheless, Valentina Abeja announced in a short statement this morning that she will present her 2016 budget at 11:00 a.m. on August 18.

According to an Animal-on-the-street poll conducted Monday by The Mammalian Daily, sixty-nine per cent of Park citizens are hopeful that the new budget will address The Park’s real needs. While ten per cent said they had grown apathetic about the budget, a full twenty-one per cent were downright negative about the chances of a budget that would strengthen The Park’s economy yet support our most vulnerable citizens.

But the poll, which was considered accurate to within two percentage points eighteen times out of twenty, likely does not reflect Park citizens’ real views, says Dr. Anneliese Cissa, head of the Livingstone School of Economics and Social Science at the University of West Terrier.

“That poll is out of date and the question needs to be revisited. The poll was taken when Animals were thinking of the budget in the abstract, when it was more of an idea than a reality,” she said in an interview on Mammalian Daily Radio early this afternoon.

According to Dr. Cissa, Park Animals have just now begun to realign their hopes and expectations with the reality of a concrete budget.

“It’s like a wish list,” she said. “You put a number of items on a wish list, but quite a few of them don’t make it onto your actual shopping list.”

Asked to venture a guess as to how a new poll would look, Dr. Cissa said she doubted whether there would be significant movement in the apathetic column.

“Perhaps a percentage point or two, I would imagine,” she said. But as for the other feelings expressed in the first poll, she had a surprising answer:

“I think some of the hopefuls will have turned unhopeful with the news [of budget day] and some of the unhopefuls will become resigned in time. So, I think within a few days, the realignment will look more like fifty-fifty than sixty-nine-twenty-one.”

And on budget day?

“I think we’ll all cycle through a range of emotions from hopeful to cynical to skeptical to disappointed and then most of us will park ourselves at thoughtful. And it is only from there that we will begin to be able to judge the value of this new budget,” she said.

DWBS issues warning to Animals regarding Humans vacationing in Park

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DWBS capture warning

Don’t get caught this Summer! Stay clear of Humans vacationing in The Park

The Department of Well-Being and Safety (DWBS) has issued its first-ever Summer security alert.

In a communiqué released this morning, the DWBS informs Animals of the increased risk of capture by Humans vacationing in The Park this Summer.

“We have estimated the level of risk to be high to very high for the Summer of 2015,” DWBS Director of Public Relations Cornelius Kakapo says in the communiqué.

“Due to recent economic challenges in the Human world, many have chosen to spend their vacations close to home. This means that we can expect to see an increase in the number of Humans vacationing in The Park during the month of August. Although this is beneficial to The Park’s economy, it can also present problems. For this reason, we advise Park Animals to be alert at all times when dealing with Humans,” the communiqué warns.

Kakapo says the alert applies to all Park Animals, including those in the tourist industry, business owners, restaurateurs, groomers, artists, and musicians.

“Humans tend to get sentimental and to make emotional attachments during vacations and that makes them more likely to try to take Park Animals home with them,” Kakapo says.

There are, however, a number of precautionary measures that Animals can take in order to keep themselves safe and free from capture. These include dealing with Humans in a “professional” manner, refraining from befriending Human children, refusing all invitations to enter vehicles, especially large ones such as vans and SUVs, and refusing any and all “suspicious” invitations and gifts.

“Remember,” Kakapo says, “Humans may not mean to do harm but neither do they have your best interests at heart.”

Animals who do experience problems with Humans are encouraged to report any incidents immediately to one of the following DWBS hotlines:

Feral Cat Helpline: 1-899-33725228
Assaulted Animals Helpline: 1-899-27728583
Missing Animals Registry: 1-899-64774642
Missing Family Members Report: 1-899-32645966
Youth line (Kittens, Puppies, Cubs, etc.): 1-899-96884546
Exotic Animals Helpline: 1-899-3968427

“Plumpen Rolletariat” artist to open PMoCA’s new exhibition in August

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Ingolf Ewald

Ingolf Ewald’s “Plumpen Rolletariat” will take centre stage at the PMoCA’s new exhibit in August

Artist Ingolf Ewald, known for his painting, “Plumpen Rolletariat,” has been selected to open the Park Museum of Contemporary Art’s newest exhibition in August.

The PMoCA’s head curator Aamuun Maroodiga made the announcement in a press release this morning:

“On behalf of the Park Museum of Contemporary Art, I am pleased to announce that artist Ingolf Ewald has graciously accepted our invitation to open our upcoming exhibition, ‘Art of the Domestic Feline,’ at a gala to be held at the museum on August 8,” the press release reads.

Ewald, who has courted controversy for over a decade with this particular painting, posted on his own web site that he was honoured by the request.

“When Aamuun Maroodiga asked me to lend my painting to the museum for the purpose of an exhibition, I said yes immediately,” he wrote.

“I have always been a supporter of the domestic art movement, since my origins lie in that territory. But this exhibition is special to me, because the curator is a close acquaintance and because I know that my work will be among other great works of domestic art.”

Although Ewald has sold many of his paintings, he maintains ownership of “Plumpen Rolletariat” and has never lent it to an exhibition before.

According to the museum’s web site, the opening gala will include an auction of a more recent work by Ewald, the proceeds from which will be donated to the CatsCare charity.

Tall Tail Books moves into Human market with “explainer videos” of books

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Tall Tail BooksRevered Park publisher Tall Tail Books announced yesterday that it will be making its first foray into the Human market this Autumn with a series of “explainer videos” of its most popular books.

The company, whose books include “Albert: A Life on the Street,” “Once Around the Block with Foster,” and “When All Good Things Begin with B,” confirmed in a statement released yesterday that it sees “great potential” in expanding into the Human market.

“We are confident that Humans will be able to understand and enjoy our books as long as they are explained to them carefully and we believe that our products will add value to what is already a large market,” said the statement, which was signed by company president Nathania T. Manx.

The first of the explainer videos will be released in late September, according to a company spokesAnimal. Tall Tail has engaged the services of one of The Park’s major animation companies, AniMAZZA, to produce the videos. AniMAZZA’s work includes the film, Peter Popinjay, which was screened at the 2009 Park Interspecial Film Festival (PIFF).

Tall Tail Books was founded as the “Small Animal’s Publisher” by writer and editor Thomas Owen Manx, who saw the need for small Animals to share their experience in the world. After Manx’s death, his daughter Nathania assumed the presidency of the company.

PFO head’s remark hints at new attitude to tourism promotion

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2015 Budget

 

In an interview yesterday with reporter Alfonsina Cavalletta of the Serangga Star Adviser, the head of the Park Finance Office (PFO) said she believed that tourism is “organic” and may not require much help from officials.

In response to a question about the promotion of tourism in The Park, Valentina Abeja said she believed that “tourism is an organic force and it builds on itself and from itself.”

Later in the interview, Abeja, who took office in February of this year, expanded on her views regarding tourism and its importance to The Park.

“I’ve listened to many of our shopkeepers over the past few months and they say they believe strongly that tourism is irrelevant to their bottom line. In some cases, I must say that I agree with them. In other cases, I think we could improve on our past ventures. I think we need to promote ourselves to a different kind of Human, as well as to domestic Animals. I think we missed the mark there. Perhaps if we bypass the Humans altogether and go directly to their Animal companions, we will attract a more profitable tourist. As it stands, however, our attempts have not yielded significant gains. I believe we need to revisit this area entirely,” she said.

Abeja will present the 2016 Park Budget in August.

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