Twenty years ago, when many buildings in Kingston”™s waterfront Rondout district were boarded up, Merle Borenstein left her restaurant management job in Manhattan and opened the Armadillo restaurant on Abeel Street. Despite all odds, the restaurant thrived and still attracts a crowd for its crisp chips and salsa, fajitas and shrimp quesadillas.
Borenstein surmises the venture did well precisely because there was a dire need for a fun, upbeat eating hole serving good food in an area that resembled a ghost town. “The business took off because I was meant to utilize it as a community outreach,” she said. “Whoever is watching over me has allowed me to be successful for no other purpose than to make a difference.”
That sense of higher purpose has carried over into Borenstein”™s many other activities, which include serving on the board of the YMCA, participating for more than a dozen years on the committee of the Hudson Valley AIDS Auction, and launching a soup kitchen (started 18 years ago; still going strong).
Yet it was the sight one day of a dog being beaten by its owner with a garden hose that galvanized this nurturing woman to discover her most precious mission, saving abandoned and abused animals. She rescued the dog after offering money to the owner and quickly fell in love with the pet. “It was probably closest to the best thing I ever lived with,” said Borenstein. “The love and loyalty were incomparable. It grabs you.” She began volunteering at the Ulster County SPCA and quickly became a guiding force, serving on the board (currently for the second time), spearheading the fundraising effort and membership drive, and helping with outreach.
It”™s partly due to Borenstein”™s involvement that the UCSPCA today has shed the depressing aspects of a traditional animal shelter and instead is more akin to a day care center for dogs and cats. Fifty cats lounge in a large room with carpeted platforms, colorful plastic toys, and comfy cat beds.
Down the hall, a dozen dogs sleep, play or wiggle out of the doorways of their private kennels to the yards. Tails wag and big brown eyes melt the hardest of hearts, but there is no tragedy involved in saying “no.” Twelve years ago, the board ”“ which included Borenstein ”“ elected to eliminate euthenization of the animals. All are placed in loving homes, even though in some cases it takes two years or more.
“Towns pick up their strays and if we have room, we”™ll take them,” Borenstein said. “If they have treatable illnesses, we”™ll treat them.” A host of volunteers walks the two-dozen dogs and puppies, landscapes the grounds, cleans up, and helps out in myriad other ways. One woman recently hosted her birthday party in the cat room, with the guests making donations. “This is a family affair,” said Borenstein. “The shelter belongs to the Ulster County public. We”™re a provider of four-paw love.”
Borenstein also participates in the annual Pause for Paws program, in which the UCSPCA partners with other dog-protection groups to set up a booth in a park or at a street festival, pass out literature and showcase a few animals as a way to educate the public about their activities.
The UCSPCA offers a spay/neuter service for cats, charging only $20 for the procedure. It started a Trap Neuter Release program, in which feral cats are captured, neutered, and given rabies shots, which helps to control the feral population and protect the animals from disease.
Another initiative she is involved with is a petition to support a new bill introduced in the state Assembly that would enable law enforcement to take action on animal “hoarders” ”“ people who take in large numbers of animals and unintentionally, perhaps, abuse them by not being able to take care of them.
Borenstein shares her home in Olive Bridge with rescued dogs Moose, Tankand and Sunshine. It”™s a dog”™s heaven, with a half-acre fenced-in yard. She often takes one of the dogs to work and extends the same liberties to her customers, who are allowed to bring their pooches.
Asked how she finds the time to run the restaurant, volunteer for the shelter and keep up with numerous other cultural activities in which she participates, Borenstein joked, “All my husbands left me. I have no life.” Impossible. If anything, this woman with the extraordinary heart proves the best life is the one cultivated through gentleness, caring and unselfish effort.
