The Raccoon River Pet Rescue facility took another step toward becoming a reality in 2019 Monday when the Perry City Council scheduled an April 1 public hearing on a voluntarily annexation of the 5.59-acre property into the city of Perry.
The planned animal shelter will be built along Iowa Highway 141 directly south of the Perry Dog Park on land owned by Joyce VanKirk, who is seeking the annexation. Construction of the shelter will begin in the spring.
“Our timeline was maybe to break ground (this) spring,” said Jill Brosnahan of Perry, president of the Raccoon River Pet Rescue. “It would take six to eight months to complete it.”
The Raccoon River Pet Rescue was incorporated in 2018 as a non-profit corporation. The new facility will take over the duties of the former Humane Society of Perry, which disbanded in 2018 after 12 years of caring for the Perry area’s stray animals.
The Raccoon River Pet Rescue is expected to partner with the city of Perry to care for strays brought to the Perry Animal Holding Facility and to manage their adoption if the animals are not claimed by their owners within seven days.
City employees at the Perry Water Pollution Control Facility have managed the Perry Animal Holding Facility since the Humane Society of Perry officially ceased operations last summer. Adoption arrangements were made between the city of Perry and AHeinz57 Pet Rescue and Transport in De Soto.
I certainly have no problem with this and just don’t see how anyone else would either. Of course, we cannot allow for the town to be overrun by stray dogs and cats but it breaks my heart to know that up until now, strays turned in are living on borrowed time. We need to have more compassion than to just hand them a virtual death sentence. Of course, there are some that are too diseased or too viscious to be adopted or released. Also, the nature of some cats is to spend most of their time outdoors no matter how tame they are. My suggestion is that any registered family cat, certified as vaccinated, spayed or neutered, should be allowed out with a notch being cut in its right ear to signify so. Any feral cat that has been neutered, vaccinated and released should have a notch cut in its left ear.
Does that mean you euthanize them after seven days? If so, you don’t have my support.
No, it means that if the owner does not claim the stray within seven days, the stray is put up for adoption.