SCAA Seeks New Contract With The City

By David Howell

Editor

WATER VALLEY – Volunteers with Second Chance Animal Alliance (SCAA) reached out to city officials to negotiate a new contract to help with the care provided for dogs picked up in the City of Water Valley.  Speaking at the Feb. 6 city board meeting, SCAA director Melissa Smith explained to aldermen that the organization’s contract with the city expired in 2016 and the non-profit organization needs more city support.  

SCAA is a donor supported, non-profit organization founded in 2014 to help improve conditions in the city pound and to ensure that dogs that come through the pound receive quality health and are returned to their home or adopted into a loving, forever family.

SCAA first inked a contract with the city in 2015, but Smith told aldermen that the city has not completely upheld their end, explaining that the city has provided electricity and water for the shelters as well as a part-time employee to help at the shelters, but has not provided the $30 fee per dog, up to 100 dogs annually, and dog food as specified in the contract. 

“Our terms of $30 per dog have not been fulfilled and we have only been funded in the course of our lifetime as an organization for 25 dogs,” Smith said.

She also explained that the contract was originally written when SCAA used the city’s pound that only houses, at maximum capacity, eight dogs. Last year SCAA purchased a building and property on Hwy. 315 and currently operates both shelters.

“We are currently receiving the food that we have for the animals in our care from our gracious donors, discounted bags from Hollywood Feed and sometimes from our personal checkbooks,” Smith added. “We would also like to ask that a budget be created where the city assists and are providing for the animals’ basic care by the hiring of two full-time and two-part time certified animal control officers, kennel attendants and shelter staff,” she continued.

Smith also explained that the part-time city employee who works at the shelters works an estimated 43 hours a pay period, seven days a week, with no days off and has done so for the last two years.

She also provided an overview of expenses incurred by the organization, including $528.50 for each dog the shelter receives and over $10,000 per month in total operations. 

SCAA volunteer Mandy Beard stressed that more training is needed to ensure that the city’s Animal Control Officer (ACO) is qualified to assess potential situations that could include handling a vicious dog or assessing medical needs. 

“Currently nobody that handles our animals with the city has this knowledge, we do,” Beard explained. 

Beard said SCAA also fields numerous phone calls from the public involving alleged neglect cases, which also necessitate proper response from trained personnel. 

“We are not just six girls that like to pet puppies, we carry certifications that cost thousands of dollars,” Smith added.

Mayor Donald Gray provided an overview of the city’s financial support since 2015, noting that the city has spent over $30,000 to provide part-time help from a city employee to assist at the shelters. Gray added that the city has provided electricity and water for the shelters.  He also said the city paid one bill to SCAA totaling $1,110 in 2015 for $30 fee the city agreed to pay SCAA per dog.

“We have not received notice since then,” Gray explained, referring to a bill for dogs that have been picked up.

Smith countered that there is supposed to be a record at city hall for dogs picked up in the city, which would trigger the payment. 

“Realistically Water Valley doesn’t have that money,” Ward 1 Alderman Kagan Coughlin noted about the $10,000 monthly cost for the shelter in addition to the estimated $50,000 price for additional staff provided by the city for a total of approximately $170,000.

“Is that what you are requesting, or a portion of the $170,000,” Coughlin asked.

“A portion” Smith answered, reiterating that SCAA needs employees to help the volunteers to help with the daily grind of feeding, cleaning and walking animals housed in the shelter.

Smith explained that the SCAA volunteers perform their daily duties in addition to working day jobs. The duties include answering phone calls, picking up dogs and transporting dogs to the vet as well as operating the shelter. 

“One question is the separation between dogs picked up in the city and other dogs y’all make take in, such as the county?” Gray asked. 

“Eighty percent of the dogs that are in our care at Second Chance come from the City of Water Valley, and we keep records of that,” Smith answered. Also the accounting is maintained separately so the statistics aren’t intermingled, SCAA volunteers added. 

“The organization is very valuable,” Coughlin said.  “It is going to take community effort because there is not money to just write a check to support the effort. I would like to find a way to help with staff since it is the most critical now. I don’t know what dollar figure we have to apply to that,” Coughlin noted. 

“In the immediate term, I would recommend if we haven’t been billed since 2015, you send the city a bill at $30 a head,” Coughlin said. 

 

“We will continue to honor this right now, even though technically it is expired,” Gray added about the most recent contract.  “Sometimes it is a breakdown with communication, on how things should be handled and we will try to handle our part on a more orderly fashion,” he also told the volunteers.

City officials agreed to table the request for two weeks, until the Feb. 20 meeting, to work out details for a new contract and establish a protocol for handling animal complaints in the city.