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Harlem Deer Caught in City-State Tussle Will Live Another Day Harlem Deer Caught in City-State Tussle Has Died
(about 2 hours later)
A white-tailed deer that had been slated for death after it wandered out of a Harlem park received a last-minute reprieve on Friday morning, as city officials relented and said they would allow state officials to relocate it to a rural area. The Harlem deer is dead.
The deer, a white-tailed buck with one crumpled antler that drew crowds for days at Jackie Robinson Park, has been the subject of an extraordinary tussling match between the offices of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio since its capture on Thursday. The deer, a white-tailed buck that had been condemned to die but was then pardoned after an extraordinary tussle between the mayor and the governor, succumbed at the city animal shelter in East Harlem on Friday afternoon, just after state officials arrived to take him upstate and release him.
“This was an animal that was under a great deal of stress for the past 24 hours and had been tranquilized for much of that time,” Sam Biederman, a spokesman for the city parks department, said. “Unfortunately, it has died.”
The deer, known variously as J.R., for Jackie Robinson, and Lefty, because of his crumpled left antler, had spent two weeks drawing adoring crowds at Jackie Robinson Park. How he traveled to a park in the middle of a crowded Manhattan neighborhood remains unclear.
After the buck left the park early Thursday morning and jumped a fence into the courtyard of a public-housing project, the police were called, and they tranquilized and captured him.
The city announced plans on Thursday afternoon to kill the deer, citing advice from state wildlife officials.The city announced plans on Thursday afternoon to kill the deer, citing advice from state wildlife officials.
That evening, Governor Cuomo offered to help the city move the deer, despite the state’s own policy not to issue permits to relocate deer “because acceptable release sites are not available and because the poor chances for deer survival do not warrant the risks.” But that evening, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo offered to help the city move the deer, despite the state’s own policy not to issue permits to relocate deer “because acceptable release sites are not available and because the poor chances for deer survival do not warrant the risks.”
The city initially spurned the governor’s offer, saying that after its time in captivity, the deer would not be able to survive.The city initially spurned the governor’s offer, saying that after its time in captivity, the deer would not be able to survive.
“If a deer is already in a natural location and you can leave them there, then they have a chance of survival, but if not, you don’t really have another option,” the mayor said on the Brian Lehrer radio show Friday morning. “It’s a question of is it going to be a quick and merciful death versus potentially a very long painful process.” “If a deer is already in a natural location and you can leave them there, then they have a chance of survival, but if not, you don’t really have another option,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said on the Brian Lehrer radio show Friday morning. “It’s a question of, is it going to be a quick and merciful death versus potentially a very long painful process.”
But just before noon, a spokesman for the city parks department, Sam Biederman, said that officials from the state Department of Environmental Conservation were on the way to the city animal shelter in East Harlem to retrieve the deer. But just before noon, Mr. Biederman said that officials from the state Department of Environmental Conservation were coming to get the deer and that the city would not stand in the way.
“Because transporting deer causes them great stress, and because relocated deer have very low survival rates,” Mr. Biederman said, “the city still believes that the most humane option here is euthanasia. However, the state is the regulatory body here, and we defer to them.” After the deer’s death, Mr. Biederman blamed the state.
“Unfortunately because of the time we had to wait for D.E.C. to come and transport the deer, the deer has perished,” he told reporters at the shelter, adding that the city had wanted to euthanize the deer all along.
The state, for its part, blamed the delay on the city.
“We offered yesterday to take possession of the deer and transport it to a suitable habitat,” the state Department of Environmental Conservation said in a statement. “The city did not accept our offer until just before noon, and while we were arriving on scene the deer died in the city’s possession.”
In fact, the long delay in settling the deer’s fate resulted from more than a day of haggling and changing signals between city and state officials. A state biologist told the city at one point Thursday that it had to either release the deer in Harlem or euthanize it, and the city deemed it irresponsible to release the deer in a crowded urban neighborhood.
It was only after public outcry arose to save the celebrity animal that the governor offered to ignore state policy and save the deer.
The move showed signs of being another example of Mr. Cuomo’s tendency to insert himself into city affairs and outmaneuver Mr. de Blasio, which he has often done, much to the mayor’s consternation.The move showed signs of being another example of Mr. Cuomo’s tendency to insert himself into city affairs and outmaneuver Mr. de Blasio, which he has often done, much to the mayor’s consternation.
Indeed, the chief spokesmen for the mayor and the governor could not resist from briefly engaging on Twitter on Friday.
“NYC isn’t going to kill Harlem deer. State trying to transport it safely upstate. Inconsistent w/ experts/DEC policy, but we’ll try & help,” wrote Eric F. Phillips, the mayor’s chief spokesman.
“Bureaucracy lost,” Richard Azzopardi, a spokesman for Mr. Cuomo, replied.
“Let’s hope for the deer’s sake you’re right,” Mr. Phillips shot back.
Paul Curtis, a Cornell University deer researcher, said that as long as the buck had not been kept tranquilized during his one and a half days in captivity, his odds of survival were quite good. Officials at the city shelter said the deer had not been tranquilized most of the time.
During the two weeks that the buck had confined himself to Jackie Robinson Park, the city, based on advice from the state, chose to monitor it and not interfere.
But on Thursday, after the deer left the park and hopped a fence into a courtyard at a nearby public-housing project, the police were called and they captured the deer, saying it posed a threat to car traffic and public safety.