Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, October 31, 1995 TAG: 9510310109
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The SPCA plans to convert the Wells Furniture Co.'s 5,200-square-foot building off U.S. 460 in Northeast Roanoke into a state-of-the-art shelter costing an estimated $1 million.
The SPCA is paying $290,000 for the property and expects to close on it in December, Frank Van Balen, president of the SPCA board of directors, said at a news conference.
But the organization is counting on raising the bulk of the $1 million needed to renovate the existing building and construct adjoining shelter space through a community fund-raising campaign.
The campaign will begin in January. Van Balen said he was confident "we'll have the money in hand" by the scheduled ground-breaking in July.
The Wells Furniture property is on Lynn Brae Drive, just beyond the old Lowe's building. The 4.3 acres is a 25 feet above street level.
"Psychologically, it was important," Steve Davidson, membership chairman of the SPCA board, said of the high-ground location.
"Eighteen months ago, we surveyed anyone who'd adopted an animal from us, and we asked them to prioritize goals that the board had discussed for our organization," he said. "An overwhelming majority agreed that the No. 1 priority for this organization was to build a new shelter and specifically that that shelter be out of the flood plain."
A new shelter has been an SPCA goal for years, even before the devastating flood of 1985, Davidson said. That year, the shelter - on Eastern Avenue in Northeast Roanoke - was nearly underwater.
"It's just been on everybody's mind, being in that dilapidated area of the flood plain," he said.
The money to buy the property will come from the SPCA building fund. Much of that money was bequeathed to the organization specifically for a new shelter.
The new shelter gives the SPCA an opportunity to turn around a sagging public image and the controversy it has endured in the past decade.
In 1989, board President William Davis-Deck admitted embezzling money from the organization's savings account - some of it set aside for new shelter construction - and funneling it to private business ventures. Days later, he committed suicide.
In 1994, three SPCA employees were fired, they claimed, for backing a failed attempt to oust then-board President Steve Davidson and other incumbents. The employees sued. Last month, a Roanoke Circuit Court judge dismissed the suits.
"We know as well as anyone can known anything that the overwhelming public sentiment was 'if you get your act together and do what you've been saying you were going to do ...''' Davidson said.
"There have been all kinds of fits and starts. This is not a fit," Davidson said of new shelter plans. "This is a start."
The new shelter is expected to have offices, an adoption center, a training room, shelter space and an isolation room.
The isolation room is perhaps the most important feature, said Al Alexander, SPCA shelter director. Disease control is the shelter's biggest expense and the biggest animal lifesaver outside of adoptions, he said.
In the current shelter, two to three animals often are housed together in one cage, increasing the risk of diseases spreading. And an inordinate amount of money is spent on disinfecting the shelter - scouring with bleach and painting over porous material with sealant paint, Alexander said.
"Look at the lives we could save with an isolation ward," Alexander said. "We can set [animals] aside, let them get better and find them a home."
An isolation room is crucial for the SPCA to meet standards of the North Shore Animal League, a Long Island, N.Y., animal rescue group. The organization operates an adoption center with staff veterinarians and accepts excess puppies from shelters in several states, including its affiliate Martinsville-Henry County SPCA.
To increase adoptions, the Roanoke Valley SPCA is trying to affiliate with the league. But before it can get on the list of league participants, its shelter must meet certain standards that include having isolation facilities and a system of air exchange that deters spread of infection among animals.
The SPCA shelter receives an average of 35 animals a day. Its adoption rate has risen from 10 percent to 12 percent last year to 42 percent this year.
The shelter houses up to 280 animals. The new shelter would have capacity for about 500, Van Balen said.
"We're hopeful that by increasing the number of animals we'll be able to take care of, that we won't put so many animals down," Van Balen said. "We have adopted out 42 percent of our animals. It doesn't take a mathematician to know that 58 percent did not make it. How much better our adoption policy will be, I don't know.
"But we will be able to keep animals longer and show them better for adoption. We're fighting desperately to save lives. We have got to save as many animals as we possibly can."
by CNB