Borough awards shelter contract

PALMER — Plans to expand and renovate the Mat-Su Borough’s animal shelter have cleared another hurdle as the Borough Assembly awarded a $5,235,023 to design and build the new shelter.

“I guess we’re at the point where we’re starting to see progress after five years, but yet the work has just begun,” said Dave Allison, chief of the Borough’s Animal Care and Regulation department.

The design-build contract went to a team consisting of construction firm Howdie Inc. and design firm Wolf Architecture. The expansion will add 13,858 square feet to the 7,650-square-foot facility.

Allison said he’s unsure when the project will break ground, but he’s pushing to start as soon as possible and hoping to start this summer.

“I want it today,” he said. “I’d get a shovel out now.”

Allison said the shelter improvements are needed and the current building is more than 20 years old.

“The population of the Valley in the mid-’80s was substantially less than we have now,” Allison said. “As we grow so does our animal population.”

Veterinarians have to perform operations on folding tables or the floor and recovering animals often lay under employees’ desks, he said. In the administrative area, employees are stacked “like cordwood.”

Tammy Clayton, finance director for the Borough, said animal control fees should cover about a third of the project’s cost. Funding is through certificates of participation, a funding mechanism similar to municipal bonds, she said.

Allison said it is not clear yet what the improvements will add to the facility, but expanded housing for animals is a must.

The shelter has trouble keeping sick or aggressive animals away from healthy, adoptable ones, he said. Often, staff has to turn people away and ask them to hold onto their animals, or ask folks who’ve taken in a stray to wait before bringing it to the shelter.

Animal rescue groups and partners like the Point MacKenzie correctional farm, which takes in horses and livestock, can often pick up the slack, but a lot of times they are also maxed out, Allison said.

Other must-haves include a new barn to house livestock and administrative offices to put some space in between employees and allow for meetings and educational presentations, he said.

The expansion project was shot down in a Borough-wide vote in 2005, Allison said, adding that every bond issue on the ballot failed that year and most have since been funded or built.

“It’s an essential service that the public needs and expects,” Allison said. “It’s a health and safety issue that we’re trying to address.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.