January 10, 2019
By: Dwayne Page
The DeKalb Animal Coalition is getting a newer truck for the shelter.
During Monday night’s regular monthly meeting, the Smithville aldermen granted a request from Shelter Director Megan Moore to purchase a 2006 Ford F150 in Knoxville. The asking price was $7,500 but city officials said it can now be bought for $6,500.
Moore said this truck will be much more reliable than the van the shelter has now and it is equipped to transport more animals.
“The van we have is on its last leg. We can carry no more than three animals. We have had to pick up as many as five at a time which takes a couple of trips back and forth to do that. The truck we are purchasing has an animal control unit on the back with a big fiberglass cab and 10 individual kennels. It also has a section in the back for a printer where the police department could issue citations on site for neglect and abuse,” said Moore.
Under a lease agreement with the animal coalition, the city is obligated to provide an animal control vehicle for the shelter but it is owned by the City of Smithville.
Moore also updated the mayor and aldermen on the operation of the shelter.
“We opened November 2017. We have had 502 animals at the shelter and 336 of those have been adopted while 117 have gone to rescues usually up to Ohio, Delaware, and places like that. That leaves 49 and most of those have been returned to owners. We have hosted three adoption events so far, two at Tractor Supply and one at Christmas on the Square in 2017. We also reinstated our volunteer program in December and we have doing classes to help train volunteers so they will know what they are doing when they come in. James Wilkerson is now a full time employee and that has helped tremendously. The shelter has been a lot more labor intensive than we previously thought. It’s a much bigger shelter than the facility we had before by far,” said Moore.