Loudon County has been accepting Blount’s stray
animals at the Loudon County Animal Shelter for $4,000 a month.
The arrangement was set to expire on June 30, but the Loudon
County Commission approved a final extension of the arrangement
at its August meeting.
“We’ve got a punch list of things that we need the public’s help
with if they’re willing,” Cunningham said. “Some of them are
little things. Some of them are big things. ... We have a very,
very limited budget. We need help.”
The Mayor’s Office is accepting the donation of items needed
during the day-to-day operation of the shelter — from toilet
paper to cat food, surgical masks to trash cans. Anyone
interested in helping out with the shelter’s needs can call
273-5700.
“We want it to be safe and we want it to be humane,” Cunningham said.
With the opening of the facility finally in sight, Cunningham has been thinking about the operational budget for the 9,000-square-foot facility.
“The utility expenses on something this size are going to be astronomical,” Cunningham said. “... I’ve been scared from the onset that we’re not going to have enough money to operate the shelter like it should be operated.”
$2 license fee
Cunningham said he believes the county
should enact a small license fee for pets that receive
rabies shots to help fund operations, but he also believes
there would be some community opposition.
“You’ll have the naysayers who stand up against a $2 license
fee,” he said.
Commission Chairman Steve Samples said the commission would
at least consider the idea.
“Certainly, I think the commission would be willing to
consider it,” he said. “There has been some talk of it being
a voluntary license fee. The commission will look at the
entire issue and try to determine what is best for the
county.”
The animal center will be a kill shelter, but Cunningham
hopes that the use of euthanasia can be minimized.
“We are trying to get as many animals out of there alive and
adopted as we can,” he said. “... It’s a fact of life we’re
going to have to do it, but the more we work to limit that,
the better everyone will feel.”
For 2009-2010, the budget for animal control is $137,000
with $80,000 to $90,000 being spent on salaries and benefits
for a full-time office manager and a full-time animal
control officer. Cunningham recently hired a part time
person to help out, too.
“We’ve got a huge, huge building,” Cunningham said. “It’s
going to be staffed with 2½ people. ... Staffing it is the
problem.”
Community service help
To help with staffing needs, Cunningham
said he is working with local judges to use people sentenced
to community service as workers in the animal center.
“The judges are being extremely cooperative,” Cunningham
said.
The Smoky Mountain Animal Care Foundation has been helping
raise funds for the construction of the shelter. The
estimated cost to build the facility as designed is $1.6
million. Private monetary and gift-in-kind donations to
SMACF have totaled $520,000 to date. This is in addition to
the amount allocated to the project to date by Blount
County.
“It’s nobody’s fault that the fundraising stalled out,”
Cunningham said. “It’s just the economy. The foundation has
done a wonderful job.”
Don and Carol Story of Maryville recently donated $50,000
toward construction of Phase II of the Blount County Animal
Center in honor of their past dogs, “Buffy” and “Dixie,” and
current family dog “Lacey.”
The County Commission previously appropriated $430,000,
which included $80,000 raised by SMACF and $350,000 in seed
money that the commission authorized in 2007 that allowed
the core of the facility to be built.
On July 16, the commission voted unanimously to spend
$197,000 to finish out Phase I of the animal shelter
construction. The funding includes $82,000 for heating and
air conditioning and $16,820 for electrical work to make the
shelter operational.
SMACF is estimating it will cost $490,000 to build the Phase
II adoption center for the shelter.
The shelter is being built behind the Boys and Girls Club,
241 Currie Ave, in Maryville.