I.C. making plans, seeking partners for new animal facility

IOWA CITY - There's still some barking about a new Iowa City animal shelter, but plans are starting to come together.

That's good news for the Iowa City Animal Care and Adoption Center, which has been housed in a building a few miles south of town since the Floods of 2008 destroyed the old shelter on Kirkwood Avenue.

Misha Goodman, animal services supervisor, said the issues with the interim shelter include poor ventilation, too few drains in the dog area and cat cages that are smaller than current standards call for.

“The problem with this space is it wasn't built for a shelter,” she said.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has committed $1.4 million, which includes a 10 percent match from the state, for a shelter comparable in size to the 7,000-square-foot old facility.

But officials say the former shelter was too small for the community's needs.

After initially proposing a $4 million, 16,180-square-foot shelter, city officials recently cut the size to 12,225 square feet and the cost to $3 million. The new shelter is to be built on Napoleon Lane on the southern edge of town.

The reductions were partly because of cost considerations and some local communities deciding they didn't want to use the new facility, said Simon Andrew, an Iowa City management intern working on the project.

Tonight, the City Council is to vote on a resolution allowing staff to move forward with the architectural design and to pursue cost-sharing agreements with interested communities.

Also, city staff expects to ask FEMA this month for an extension to have construction finished by the end of 2014.

The city of late has been criticized on a couple of fronts regarding the shelter.

One is the cost, with the phrase “a Taj Mahal animal shelter” being used in some corners. It's also been noted that an Iowa City homeless shelter opened in 2010 at an estimated cost of $3.25 million.

Goodman said the proposed animal shelter will be run as efficiently as possible.

She also said the homeless shelter is not a good comparison because an animal shelter must be able to withstand excessive wear and tear and have features like air-exchange systems. It's like comparing apples and oranges, she said.

“They both might be fruits, these both might be buildings, but unfortunately, you'd be better off comparing it (the animal shelter) to a hospital,” she said.

Iowa City also has hit a rough spot in negotiations with other Johnson County governments.

The Iowa City shelter now has agreements with Johnson County, Coralville, North Liberty and Solon for services, while other jurisdictions do not pay for use.

In fiscal 2010, Iowa City funded 60 percent of the shelter's operations but accounted for 57 percent of the animals. Iowa City Manager Tom Markus, with the City Council's backing, has made clear he wants the cost to be distributed proportionally.

Other jurisdictions have been asked to contribute to the construction costs for the new shelter and to pay annual operating expenses at an amount equal to the three-year average of the percentage of animals they're responsible for.

Many city and county officials found the initial estimates, based on the larger facility, much too high. So far only Coralville, University Heights and the University of Iowa have agreed to participate in the new shelter.

Johnson County and Solon are still negotiating, and all other area governments have said “no” or have not responded.

North Liberty, for example, is going with Cedar Valley Humane Society in Cedar Rapids instead - a move City Administrator Ryan Heiar estimates will save $40,000 a year.