Washougal dog shelter renovation nearly done

Renovations at the West Columbia Gorge Humane Society’s Washougal dog shelter are improving life for both the dogs awaiting homes and the shelter staff who care for them.

“The dog shelter has needed this for a very, very long time,” said WCGHS Executive Director Micki Simeone. “Dogs are now going to be properly housed in wonderful kennels.

“These kennels are top of the line, the best you can get,” Simeone said. “They are way safer for the dogs and the people. The dogs are more comfortable, they have more privacy, and it’s just a safer, healthier environment. It’s a much better system.”

The $165,000 remodel, which removed 11 aging cinder-block kennels and replaced them with new, stainless-steel enclosures, will allow the shelter to house larger dogs, such as malamutes and mastiffs, that WCGHS used to have to turn away. The renovations also will provide space for quarantining dogs accused of biting.

According to Simeone, the dog shelter, originally built for animal control, was not suited for adoption purposes prior to the recent renovations.

“The shelter is literally the dog pound that the city of Washougal built 25 years ago,” Simeone said.

The old kennels were meant to hold stray dogs for just three days.

“They were not meant to be staffed and not meant for the public,” Simeone said. “And over the course of 25 years, those kennels degraded to the point where they were falling apart.”

WCGHS collaborated with the Vancouver-based Humane Society for Southwest Washington to handle stray dogs during the four-month renovation project, but were not able to accommodate dogs surrendered by their owners.

“The four- to six-week project turned into a three-and-a-half-month project, and it’s been very, very hard, because we don’t like to say ‘no,’ but we are working as quickly as possible to reopen,” Simeone said, predicting that the shelter would open to the public sometime this week.

Funds for the shelter renovations came from community donations, a bequest from former Washougal resident Charlene Lampton and a donation from WCGHS board member Chris Foster, who operates the Fergus Fund, which raises money for shelter projects.

“Our donors were very, very generous to help us pay for (the renovations),” Simeone said. “Once I said, ‘We’re gonna do this, and this is what it’s going to cost,’ within two months, we had the money. It was crazy.”

For more information about the Washougal shelter, visit wcghs.org.

Doug Flanagan: 360-735-4669; [email protected]