Happy 4th Birthday FOTAS

We keep coming back to what Gandhi said: "The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated."  What about a large rural county; can they be judged as well?  Four years ago this week, Friends of the Animal Shelter, Inc. was created to confront that very question.  How great can a home community be when it is handling thousands of its unwanted animals like refuse?

FOTAS started in 2009 raising money and making upgrades to the existing facility: a roof and floor for the overflow pens, a large dog play yard, a lovely adoptable cat house, laundry equipment, grooming tub, stainless cage banks for surgery patients.  We established a volunteer program, a foster care program, and a transfer program.  We helped Aiken County residents confront the dirty secret that well over 5,000 animals, most of which were adoptable pets, were arriving at the county shelter annually and almost all of them were dying there.  But with all the work that went into our current county animal control facility, everyone who actually went there knew the upgrades were mostly lipstick on a pig.  Aiken County needed, and justly deserved, a new county animal shelter.   

FOTAS, since its inception, has seen itself as an ally and partner of county government.  Animal control is a public obligation, a component of health and safety; animal welfare and advocacy is not. A community has to determine who they want to be, how they want to operate in and on the world in terms of its relationship to the innocents and dependents within it.  FOTAS has given animal advocates in our community a voice and the resources to leverage that voice.  And God smiled upon that effort by providing a team of county employees, elected officials, and shelter staff to join forces with the will of the Aiken County community, and to chart the way to a brand new Aiken County Animal Shelter, along with the programs to support its success.

FOTAS paid for the study to determine the appropriate course to an adequate county shelter.  When it was determined that a new shelter was the only effective and efficient way forward, FOTAS paid $125,000 for the architectural and engineering plans.  This was 25% more than the original figure agreed upon.  The county found the perfect piece of property on the corner of May Royal and Wire Road, and on March 3rd of this year we broke ground with a high-spirited ceremony.  The building is expected to be completed by the end of the year.  FOTAS has undertaken the responsibility to "Fit, Furnish and Finish" the facility.  The Fit, FURnish and Finish fundraising campaign is underway, and there are numerous opportunities to participate and to contribute.  For more complete information, contact FOTAS or go to the website.

We can be excited about our new building, but FOTAS also realizes that a building alone is not the answer.  Without a cultural shift to make responsible pet owners part of the fabric of our community, no building will ever be large enough.  To that end, FOTAS established the Spay Neuter Assistance Program (SNAP) one year ago.   SNAP now partners with the County Voucher Program and the SPCA Albrecht Center and hundreds of dogs and cats have been fixed, meaning literally thousands fewer unwanted animals. 

We have so much to be grateful for in the last four years, and as FOTAS begins its 5th year, so much to look forward to.  This time next year, our new County Shelter will be humming.  We hope to encourage more and more community pride and involvement.  Our vision is that no adoptable pet will have to die there.  FOTAS is one reflection of Aiken County's moral progress - and its greatness.  Join us.  Please help. We still have a long way to go.

FOTAS Volunteers work with the AIKEN COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER, 411 Wire Road.  For more information, contact “info@fotasaiken.org” or visit FOTAS on line at www.fotasaiken.org

Aiken County Animal Shelter:  “By the Numbers”

The WEEK of July 8th thru 14^th ‘13

Brought in:  73 dogs and 44 cats!!

Adopted:  17 dogs and 1 cat 

Put down:   43 dogs and 36 cats!

Aiken County Shelter  “Pets of the Week”

SISSY  – Hound mix. 1.5 yrs.   A sweet, playful forever friend!  Yours for only $70

 

DALE – Tabby kitten. He is adorable! Your new baby for only $35

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*All adoption fees include: Spay/Neuter, heartworm test, all shots, worming, and microchip.

 

Site Prep for the New County Shelter is a Family Affair

“We design everything from the ground down,” is how Tilden Hilderbrand sums up the work he and his partner, Todd Hass, do as a surveying and civil engineering firm here in Aiken.

In fact, if one were to walk across Aiken County, you would be hard pressed not to cross a site that they have worked on, especially if you include Citizens Park or the tennis courts at Odell Weeks, or the more than 350 jobs they have done for the Aiken County Schools, People’s Bank, Holiday Inn, Cedar Creek, and the new Fresh Market project on Whiskey Road. 

However, it is unlikely that any undertaking in the realms of site development connects to more hearts these days than the one on the corner of May Royal and Wire Road, the site of the new Aiken County Animal Shelter.  And for Tilden Hilderbrand, it is a special labor of love. Here’s why.

Three years ago this month, eight stalwart FOTAS volunteers turned out for our very first public event, “Trick-or-Treat on Newberry Street.”  Among the new organization’s representatives were Tilden Hilderbrand’s wife, Susan, and his two son’s Alex and Seth (pictured here with our Cat-of-the-Week).

 Susan and the boy’s commitment to the adoptable animals at the County Shelter predated FOTAS.  Nearly every day after school, they took pictures of the adoptable dogs and cats and faithfully put them up on the website, Petfinder.com.  That October, 2009, the Hilderbrand boys went far beyond service to FOTAS in wearing our paper maché mascot costumes. 

FOTAS also came to rely on Susan for her creative displays of adoptable animals at events (like the Wizard of Oz), and the County Shelter signs in True Value Hardware, Stoplight Deli and Bone-i-Fide Bakery downtown.  Without her beautiful photographs, people who would never go to the shelter might not know that the animals or the shelter, were even there.

Now Tilden Hilderbrand has joined the family in service to a project more than a decade on the minds of too few who knew the need.  And when you are designing a Public Animal Shelter, “everything from the ground down,” gets at the essentials of the project.

The four-plus acre lot is a rolling woodlot, and the architect working with the county and FOTAS, was determined to keep as much of the wooded park-like feel that the project design could realistically encompass. 

Hass and Hilderbrand’s expertise will save many trees; they will determine the minimum earth to be moved; how the facility will tie into utilities; they assure the accuracy of the site footprint; and, who to see for what essential permits. 

Every single person connected with this project understands how important every dollar saved is to its ultimate success, and no one more than Hilderbrand and Hass. 

Once again, Aiken County owes a debt of gratitude to this firm, and once again FOTAS is deeply thankful to the Hilderbrand family.

Brochures depicting the new County Shelter and opportunities to contribute will be available soon.  Get excited; get involved! 

  FOTAS Volunteers work with the AIKEN COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER, 411 Wire Road.  For more information, contact “info@fotasaiken.org” or visit FOTAS on line at www.fotasaiken.org

Aiken County Animal Shelter:  “By the Numbers”

September 24^th thru 30^th   

Received: 30 dogs and 60 cats!

Adopted: 16 dogs and 4 cats

Put down: 22 dogs and 47 cats

 Aiken County Shelter “Pets of the Week!” So much LOVE for so little!

SERGIO – 1 yr. loveable Lab mix needs to go, so he is on sale for $35.  Great deal for a great dog.

MOMI (3yrs) and Tilden’s son, SETH – The cat is gorgeous.  She is yours for only $35.    

 

 

    

 

 

 *All adoption fees include: Spay/Neuter, heartworm test, all shots, worming, and microchip