Regarding Persons of the Year 2011 and a Community for 2012

In selecting “The Officer” as the 2011 Person of the Year, the Aiken Standard’s New Year’s wish was “that 2012 can be a year of healing and a year of growing.” 

The wish specifically acknowledges a community and a family stunned by tragedy and deep in mourning; and, as such, FOTAS will take this opportunity to lend our collective voice to that hope, and support to the Richardson family.

“Public Safety,” is often a blessing and a benefit that we take for granted, like the sun that lights and warms or the air that cools and sustains us, until it is not there.

In our work with Aiken County Animal Services, FOTAS volunteers have the opportunity to learn how our Animal Control Officers work to protect the two-legged and four-legged citizens of our community.  These agents are on call 24/7 assuring public safety and animal welfare to the best of their ability.  None of us would want to witness, nor intervene in, some of the tragic circumstances they encounter.  To each Officer we would like to extend our heartfelt appreciation for the challenging job they undertake on our behalf. 

The three women honored as a Team by the nomination for Person of the Year were collectively astounded, and individually deeply honored to be singled out for such recognition.

As founders and board members of Friends of the Animal Shelter, Inc., they have worked hard to forge their team and to establish a public charity as deeply dedicated to its professed mission as FOTAS has become.  “FOTAS, Making a Difference,” is what the logo says, making a difference in the lives of thousands of animals and in hundreds of humans who are directly and indirectly their guardians here in Aiken County.

There is nothing quite as powerful as an opportunity recognized, seized and exploited, especially when it can improve the lives of an entire community.

FOTAS was an idea whose time had come.  The founders were the right people present at the right time, but without the nascent desire throughout our community to make a badly needed change, nothing could have happened. Leadership is an initiative that inspires followership. 

Our Chief Animal Control Officer Bobby Arthurs continues to look for ways to improve Aiken County Animal Services, through the ethic and efficacy of his officers and his shelter staff.  Their ideas and initiatives routinely surface for expanding spay/neuter, maintaining useful records, enabling public safety and cooperation, and for saving as many animals as they possibly can, in an environment never intended for such a lofty purpose.

Results are what accrue to an unprecedented Public-Private Partnership.  The founders of FOTAS set the stage for a community that professed to be animal-loving to live up to its self-image; hence, FOTAS volunteers and donors to the cause continue to grow, and our Aiken County government could not be more supportive.

Aiken County will see its new shelter in the year to come; and thus the year of “healing and growing’ will, in part, manifest.  

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”

For Dec. 26th thru Jan. 1st 2012

Dogs taken in: 44

Cats taken in:  15

Dogs adopted: 3

Cats adopted: 7

Dogs euthanized:  13

Cats euthanized:  7

Aiken County Shelter “Pets of the Week” 

 

DASHER – 3-yr-old handsome shepherd mix

a big boy who wants to be a loyal companion. 

$70 includes shots, neuter, microchip.

SAMANTHA – 3 yrs old, part-Siamese beauty.  

 Big blue eyes say, “Love me.”  $35 includes shots, spay, microchip.