About APLNJ

Animal Protection League of NJ is dedicated to eliminating animal suffering and exploitation by promoting respect for animals.

To reach this goal, we

• Educate to increase public awareness of the institutionalized and legalized abuse of animals
• Encourage activism in our own communities to end the cruelty
• Promote lifestyle changes to reduce and eliminate the suffering

Issues of concern include testing on animals, the killing of wildlife for management or sport, the fur industry, animals raised as food for human consumption, animals in entertainment, companion animal overpopulation and more.

APLNJ, established in 1983, is a community based, nonprofit, educational organization working toward a peaceful, nonviolent co-existence with our earthly companions both human and nonhuman. Through our programs of promoting responsible science, ethical consumerism, and environmentalism, we advocate change that greatly enhances the quality of life for animals and people, and protects the earth.

APLNJ maintains a centrally located administrative office. The director, office staff and dedicated volunteers enable us to keep abreast of and address issues throughout the state in a timely manner.

APLNJ Staff

Susan Russell - Wildlife Policy Specialist

Susan Russell, whom the Star Ledger described as “formidable" and "gutsy," is a veteran wildlife protection professional with nearly thirty years of state, national, and international experience. She is former vice president for wildlife, Friends of Animals, Inc., (New York, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C.), and former legislative advisor for the Animal Welfare Institute’s Society for Animal Protective Legislation in Washington, D.C.

In New Jersey, the late Assemblyman D. Bennett Mazur, sponsor of New Jersey's landmark laws banning steel-jaw leghold traps and trade in wild-caught birds, praised Russell as "a consummate professional who really knows how to get the job done." The law's sponsors credited Ms. Russell's "tireless work" and provision of quality educational materials to the Legislature as the prime reason for passage of the trap law. In addition to spearheading, researching,and lobbying the leghold law and overseeing resultant litigation, Russell directed and lobbied the successful campaign for New Jersey's Wild Bird Law, which outlaws importation of wild-caught, exotic species for the pet trade.

Russell has been a repeat NGO (non-governmental observer) at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), where she participated in working groups. She wrote the AWI petition brief to the Secretary of the Department of the Interior to halt trade in exotic birds from Senegal and participated in lobbying for re-authorization of the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Wild Bird Conservation Act.

Russell has researched and written in-depth analyses of the U.S. fur trafficking and trapping trades. Her "Urban Wildlife Series" focuses on three mismanaged species currently under the gun, and exploited for hunter access: white-tailed deer, Canada geese, and the American black bear. (See APLNJ’s “Urban Wildlife Series: The Black Bear”). Russell, whose family arrived on these shores at Jamestowne and on the Mayflower, was deeply involved in the successful campaign to halt Disney’s planned edge city at Manassas National Battlefield. She has been published by theNew York Times and other national publications, and has appeared on national, state, and Canadian television and radio.

As a result of her experience with the leghold trap and subsequent litigation, Russell honed her expertise on the coziness of government wildlife regulators - the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and related state wildlife agencies -- with ammunition, firearms, archery, and fur trade associations, and the unseemly "partnerships" that dominate U.S. wildlife policy.

Russell's "Urban Wildlife Series: State Wildlife Action Plans and Wildlife-Use Trade Associations." (link) focuses on the involvement of partnered corporate conservation groups, trade, and green washing.

When asked why she chose her field, she responds: "A deep and abiding love and respect for animals. I enjoy them, I 'get' their ways. A corresponding abhorrence of cruelty. I agree with Twain; animals often put the human race to shame. Secondly, I actually expect our government to represent everyone, not special interests. Thirdly, a low tolerance for what is euphemistically called 'bunk." Put those three together, and it was a given."

Russell attended Marymount University in Arlington, Virginia, and was graduated with an education degree from Monmouth University. Her other interests are books, politics, wildflower and perennial gardening, Nantucket, colonial American history, and of course, her beloved wild Canada geese, ducks, and swans. She lives on the Navesink River in Fair Haven, New Jersey.

Photo credit: Bob Bielk/Staff Photographer / Bob Bielk/Asbury Park Press - used with permission/licensed.

In Memoriam

In 2003, APLNJ lost Matt Fancera - a friend, colleague and Advisory Board member. Click here to learn more about Matt's activism and his legacy for the animals.