York County Supervisors voted last week to approve a proposal to join the cities of Newport News, Hampton and Poquoson in constructing a 29,900 foot animal shelter to serve the localities. So far, York County and Newport News have approved the proposal.
The new building is scheduled to open in fall 2013 on the corner of Jefferson Avenue and Briarfield Road in Newport News, said Kim Lee, a spokesperson for Newport News. The proposals call for a 40-year deal between the localities. The new construction is necessary after the Peninsula Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals announced they will no longer provide shelter services for the localities after June 30, 2013.
“We’re breaking away from the cities because we are going to be an adoption guarantee organization,” said Leslie Magner, a spokesperson for the Peninsula SPCA. “We will be admitting healthy and adoptable animals.” According to the Peninsula SPCA’s website, the organization is striving to minimize euthanasia by committing to save all healthy and treatable animals and reserving the practice for unhealthy, untreatable animals.
Magner said up to 30 animals per day—a combination of strays, owner surrenders and other animals—currently enter the SPCA shelter in Newport News. Following the break with the localities, which pay the SPCA for the services it provides, the organization will be entirely dependent on the public for its funding, relying on fundraising and donations.
The SPCA’s announcement in November 2010 left York County and the other localities in need of shelter services. York County officials determined that building and maintaining a shelter exclusively for York County was too expensive. Unlike the other three localities, which depended entirely on the SPCA shelter for services, York County’s northern section uses the Heritage Humane Society of Williamsburg for shelter services. That arrangement will continue.
York County considered a number of solutions to the problem, according to York County staff. A facility that would exclusively serve York County is estimated to cost between $3.7 and $5 million to build in addition to approximately $1 million in annual operations costs. An agreement with Gloucester Mathews Humane Society would require a $750,000 capital contribution in addition to a $93,144 annual price tag for operations costs. That arrangement would still leave much of the county with no place to take cats. Expanding the arrangement with the Heritage Humane Society of Williamsburg was not feasible due to space constraints. Using a hybrid of all three of these options also proved not to be viable, according to York County staff.
When the proposal for the shelter went before the York County Supervisors at their Nov. 20 meeting, York County Fire Chief Stephen Kopzcynski characterized the current deal with the SPCA as “very good” for York County. He said the current deal charges the county around $65,000 per year for shelter services, so in the first year of the new deal alone, York County is looking at approximately $180,000 in additional expenses for animal control.
Since the new shelter in Newport News will not be ready by the July 1 termination of service by the SPCA shelter, members of the SPCA board who represent Newport News and Hampton are discussing a potential extension of shelter services until the new shelter is ready, according to York County staff.
The new shelter is estimated to cost $9.4 million, according to the proposal for the facility that went before the Newport News City Council Tuesday. The council voted unanimously to approve the project. The planning and construction costs for the shelter will be funded through general obligation bonds issued by the City of Newport News. A general obligation bond is commonly used by municipalities and is a pledge to use legally available resources to repay bond holders in a fixed amount of time, usually over several years. The exact length and amount of the bonds for the shelter have yet to be specified, according to the proposal.
The allocation of capital costs—planning and construction—is fixed, with the figures determined by using 2011 population estimates for each locality: Newport News will pay 47.21 percent, Hampton will pay 35.83 percent, York County will pay 13.77 percent and Poquoson will pay 3.19 percent, according to the proposal. The user charges are split into three separate areas: a debt service component (paying down the capital costs), operating expenses and a land rent component.
The debt service component is fixed to the capital allocation figures generated from the 2011 population estimates, however the other two items, while married to those figures for the first year of operation, will be re-evaluated annually in accordance with how much each locality uses the shelter. York County officials estimated a $240,000 annual cost, according to a memo presented to the York Supervisors at their Nov. 20 meeting.
The proposal is tentatively scheduled to go before Poquoson’s City Council on Dec. 10 and Hampton’s City Council on Dec. 12. According to the proposal that went before the Newport News City Council, a steering committee with representation from all four localities will provide input on any issues that arise in the operation and maintenance of the shelter. The committee, which will meet no less than once every three months, will propose annual budgets for the shelter.
York County sent approximately 750 animals to the SPCA and Heritage Humane Society shelters between July 1, 2011 and June 30, 2012.
