Home at Last Receives Deed from County; Hopes to Raise Money to Renovate Facilities
Pictured: Home at Last Humane Society.
By Cole Goodwin
It's a good day for cats and dogs in Wasco County.
On December 1st Wasco County Commissioners voted unanimously to donate the property Home At Last Humane Society sits on to Central Oregon Animal Friends.
COAF currently operates two humane society locations. One in The Dalles and one in Madras, OR.
When COAF took over operations of Home At Last in The Dalles in 2018, it necessitated the return of deed ownership to the County. Now that things have stabilized, the deed has been donated to COAF.
Now that day has come, and COAF couldn't be happier about it, saying that owning the property would allow them to pursue more diverse grant funding for renovations.
"It's easier when you own the building to receive grants." said Stephen Drynan, Chief Executive Director of Home at Last. "It's going to allow us to go after grants that we couldn't have otherwise gone after."
Drynan said Home At Last hopes to apply for a $30,000 capital improvement grant from Google to improve and beautify the property following the transfer of the deed.
A panoramic shot of the Home At Last property. Currently HALHS must utilize multiple out buildings to get the job done. Spare buildings are being used to store donated goods, have enough space for cats, dogs, house staff and quarantine sick animals.
What's at the top of their renovations wishlist?
Expanding their kennels and their outdoor dog play yard.
"We've put in 11 new kennels, and we want 13 more," said Drynan.
"And I want to replace the fencing in the play yards and do solid rail fencing vs. steel post fencing; it's time for that," said Drynan. "We want to put in more play yard."
Why is the play yard such a top priority?
"It makes for a more adoptable dog if they can get their energy out," said Drynan. "We try to get them out every day and make sure they can go out and stay outside for a while."
Drynan said he'd like to knock out all the walls of Home At Last one by one to build a bigger and better facility that stays within their current allotted footprint. But that will take major funding to occur.
"Better facilities make for more adoptable animals," said Drynan.
Animal adoption rates are down, and it's getting crowded.
Drynan said that Home At Last was also considering an extensive capital campaign to build a new facility due to the rate at which they were outgrowing their current space.
"We need more space. We are serving multiple counties," said Drynan. "We're in need of expansion."
Home At Last currently has 61 animals in their care, he said.
"We're doing right around 40-50 adoptions a month," said Drynan. "And we're trying to get that up to 80-90 like when we were running it before."
"I'm lucky I have a fantastic fundraising person, Erin Foote-Morgan. She's doing a fantastic job. She's taken so much off my plate," said Drynan.
Drynan said they also hoped to renovate their facilities to create a more welcoming place.
"We want to make the place more inviting for people to come and see," said Drynan.
Improved facilities could equal more outside adoptions & overnight stays.
Drynan said that more welcoming facilities might also have a community impact that some people might not know about: bringing outside money into the community via overnight stays.
Hey everyone meet Buddy! He is a domestic short hair. He is an adorable little gray tabby with a big personality. He loves attention. He loves to hear himself talk, and he will let you know when he is hungry. He loves to sleep in comfort and loves to ride around like a parrot. He will need a special diet for urine crystals which we will explain to you during the adoption. Buddy is $65. This includes his neuter, up-to-date vaccines, microchipped. He has a free 30 day trial of pet health insurance and a free vet visit within the first two weeks of adoption. More information here.
"We have a lot of adoptions from outside the community," said Drynan.
Outside adoptions give us an opportunity to help the community by getting people to book overnight stays here when they visit. The more outside adoptions we can do, the more it helps the community in general."
"We had a dog go to British Columbia. They stayed the night here, spent hours with the pup, stayed another night, came and got him, and went home. They stayed at a hotel and ate meals and had to find stuff to do while they were here. We try to bill it as "making a day of it.
And because of word of mouth, we've had six more dogs adopted out to British Columbia," said Drynan.
The overnight stays result from a policy that requires adoptive pet parents to come and have visitations with their pets before they can take them home. The policy exists to ensure happier longer-lasting adoptions as it allows Home At Last to evaluate adoptees' interactions with the animal they are adopting and get the pet and parents comfortable with one another prior to adoption.
"We never ship the dogs to their location. We want to meet them and make sure they are a good fit for the animals," said Drynan.
Say Hello to Georgie! This goofy large loving fellow is looking for his new furever home. He is about 9 months old and currently weighs in at 49 pounds. He is an active pup who would benefit from an active home life. He is very shy at first, and would do better in a home with no other animals. His adoption fee is $300.00. This includes his neuter, up-to-date vaccines, and he is microchipped. Georgie also comes with a free 30-day trial of pet health insurance, a free vet visit within the first two weeks of adoption and free custom engraved ID tag. More Info.
A new chapter.
Getting ownership of their location is the first step in what Home At Last hopes is a new chapter for animal adoptions in Wasco County.
Drynan extended his thanks to the Wasco County Commissioners for granting the deed to the land and was excited about the new opportunities now available to the non-profit organization for funding their renovations.
About Central Oregon Animal Friends
“We make it our mission to fight for abused and abandoned animals and foster a community where no companion animal will be killed because it is homeless.
From the Columbia Gorge to south of Madras, from Warm Springs to Hood River, we care for and adopt out more than 1,500 dogs and cats per year in service to this mission,” reads the COAF website.
Want to get involved in supporting Home At Last Humane Society?
Adopt
Visit Homeatlasths.org for more information about adopting.
Volunteer
Click here for more information on applying to volunteer with Home At Last.
Volunteers are needed for lots of things! Including everything from spending time with the animals to processing donated cans!
Malia’s Mountain of Cans to Cash.
Home At Last received over 138 donations of cans over the weekend.
”It’s great for the animals. It’s a good way of making money,” said Malia Steinbeck who works at HALHS.
She said it would be nice to have some volunteers help with processing the cans.
“Rotary club came out one day and helped, and that was great,” said Steinbeck.
Some people have commented that the donated cans at Home At Last are an eyesore.
“So many people don’t like the way it looks but what they don’t understand is that this is all donated money,” said Steinbeck. “And every night people jump over this fence and steal cans.”
Steinbeck said it would be nice if they could raise money to have an enclosed covered area to process the cans so that they wouldn’t be as visible. In addition, having a covered processing area would keep water from getting into the cans.
“Water gets in there and it gets gross pretty quickly,” said Steinbeck “Sometimes there’s frogs in there and all kinds of things.”
Become a Foster Family for a Furry Roommate
Click here for more information.
Donate
Click here to view donate options.
Learn more about how to become a kennel sponsor!
