The council, in its Fiscal 2006-2007 Budget, appropri-ated $25,000 toward the shelter facility to be constructed on property adjacent to Centre Industrial Park. Waters pre-sented a sample contract for the council to consider for transferring the funds to the Humane Society.
The Humane Society, Waters said, requested a $50,000 appropriation from the Chero-kee County Commission. The commission, however, only voted for half of that amount which is $25,000 less than the Humane Society needs to proceed with construction.
The Humane Society Board of Directors agreed to borrow against the property to get more funds if they could raise $75,000 this year and also $75,000 next year, Waters said.
“The board pretty much agreed that if we got what we asked for, which was $50,000 from the county for this year,” said Waters. “And if we could get the same commitment next year, then at the end of next year we would begin construction.”
With Centre’s appropriation, Cherokee Humane Society will have $90,000 in its building fund, Waters said. A volunteer has agreed to do some grant writing for the Humane Society and the Humane Society will continue to do fundraisers.
Mayor Protem Bess Yarbrough filled in for Mayor Phil Powell who was absent from the meeting. She feels that the county should take the lead in this project. Law provides that counties provide shelters for the protection of citizens. She noted that Centre has a population of around 3,500 and that many of the stray animal reports have come from outside the city limits.
Councilman Harry Moon stated that many citizens are still under the impression that the Humane Society, once the shelter is complete, will provide animal control. While the Humane Society is willing to house the animal control offi-cers’ office in the shelter, each municipality will be responsible for this service, said Waters.
“We hope that once the shelter is built, the munici-palities will continue to give an annual contract every year to help with maintaining and operating the shelter,” said Waters.
Once the shelter is operational, Waters estimated the Humane Society’s Annual Budget would run around $100,000.
Mrs. Yarbrough suggested that Waters meet with the county commission once again on this matter. The new com-missioners might have different views on providing funding for the shelter.
Mrs. Yarbrough urges local citizents to contact their com-missioners on this issue as well.
On the subject of animals, some local residents ex-pressed their disappointment in the council’s recent vote not to approve a leash law for the city.
Bill Bailey said he was encouraged by some of the dis-cussions in prior meetings, only to learn later that the council voted down the proposal.
“I was very excited about that,” said Bailey. “I thought everything was going good. But it is something I think needs to be revisited. We are talking about animal control. Of course there’s going to be some time before we have things ready to house animals. We have animals and we keep them up. But there’s a lot of people around us that don’t.”
Ron Thomas lives across the street from Bailey.
“There’s about 15 dogs on this one block where we live on a dead end street,” said Thomas. “And I have continu-ously had to work on my fence where dogs are trying to dig. We would like to see a leash law. Because they (dogs) do leave everything in our front yard.”
“My mother is now 87 years old,” said Marsha Thomas. “She started carrying her umbrella with her when she walks to the mailbox to keep the dogs from biting her. These are dogs that are just wandering in the neighborhood. If we walk in our yard, they come after us on our own property. They say they can’t get that (shelter) building built for two years. But there is a problem here now.”
Bailey mentioned the recent incident in Spring Garden in which a local woman was attacked by at least five dogs. There is a possibility the liability of such incidents could fall back on the city if there is no law or ordinance in place, he said.
“For most of these animals, you know who they belong to,” said Bailey. “You can go down the neighborhood, talk to your neighbor, see who is feeding this dog. Let’s put a fine on the homeower. We can say, ‘Look if you are not keeping your dog up, it is $50 a day,’ whatever it may be.”
“I really would like to see something done,” said Bailey. “I will put in some time, whatever it takes. This is something that really needs to addressed.”
Mrs. Yarbrough reiterated that the proposed ordinance had no provisions for en-forcement or housing the animals.
“This is a problem that all municipalities have, espe-cially in small towns,” said Mrs. Yarbrough. “I would like to see a leash law, but we need to start with requiring licenses for the dogs, an animal control officer and then a place where we can put the animals. That was my decision. I voted against it because we were not ready.”
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