Charlotte’s animal shelter will be getting more space after zoning request is approved
Editor’s note: This story was updated throughout on Nov. 19, 2024.
The stray cats and dogs living in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Animal Care and Control shelter can expect to see a new facility in the future while they wait to be adopted.
On Monday, Charlotte’s City Council approved a rezoning request that would allow for a new animal shelter and adoption center to be built on seven acres between York Memorial Park and the Jeff Adams Tennis Center in the Yorkmount neighborhood.
The new facility is part of an expansion project that will help alleviate the growing pressure the main facility at Byrum Drive is feeling, as well as the satellite shelter on Toomey Avenue, which is set to close at an unknown date.
The project is in the advanced planning and design phase. It doesn’t have a funding plan yet nor has a construction timeline been set but the approved rezoning was the first step.
However, the proposed plan is for the new site to be a 30,000-square-foot, one-floor shelter and adoption center at 5400 S. Tryon St. It will house about 100 dogs and 16 cats.
Growing city, growing capacity issues
The animal shelter was built roughly 30 years ago when the city of Charlotte had a population of about 550,000.
Fast forward to today, and the city with a population close to a million people needs a bigger facility, shelter director Dr. Joshua Fisher said during a September community meeting on the proposed rezoning.
Shelter staff have been asking for more space for years. The capacity problems were exacerbated after the height of the pandemic, Melissa Knicely, the communications manager for the facility, told The Charlotte Observer in January.
“At any given point, I could almost send out an email that says ‘Hey we’re close to capacity,’ ” Knicely said. “I can’t do that every day because it loses its effectiveness.”
This year, the shelter has reached capacity at least seven times, according to social media posts. The most recent was on Oct. 3, according to an Instagram post.
“Unfortunately, you have become accustomed to hearing from us almost daily, that we have a full shelter,” the post read. “Today is no different, except that we just learned that euthanasia of dogs is imminent.”
A little over 500 dogs and 300 cats have been euthanized as of Aug. 31, according to shelter statistics. It’s unclear whether the animals were killed due to space issues.
The shelter has previously said that space and lack of staff has led to euthanasia but the facility does attempt to get an animal adopted or fostered before euthanization is considered.
The shelter’s adoption rates are considered strong. More than 3,400 cats and dogs have been adopted as of Aug. 31. The shelter has also reunited 793 dogs and 72 cats to their owners.
But euthanization is a problem across the state.
North Carolina ranked third in the nation for the number of animals killed in shelters, according to a March 2023 study by Veterinarians.org. The study said close to 28,800 animals were killed in state shelters in a given year.
As of Oct. 21, the shelter was taking care of 462 dogs, according to a social media post.
“Numbers are on the rise again,” the post reads. “We wish that meant something better but that means we have dogs we had to take in and that need a furever home.”
Calls for space are being answered
Fisher said the shelter is focused on being life-saving and with the proposed new facility, it may be able to do just that.
The existing shelters at 8315 Byrum Dr. and 2700 Toomey Avenue combined have 220 enclosures for dogs and 138 individual feline enclosures.
The new facility will provide additional space for more animals. It will mainly operate as an adoption center and will have a small medical suite.
In October, City Council held a public hearing on the proposed rezoning. The only concern was environmental issues.
A service station and junkyard was previously located on the site, according to Miller. But an environmental study showed there were no contaminants in the soil that “exceeded” allowed state levels.
Further expansion ideas are still ongoing. There’s more space at both the Byrum site and the proposed site. Both buildings could be increased in the future, Miller said during the community meeting.
And the shelter will need it.
The temporary satellite shelter at 2700 Toomey Avenue may close at an unknown time due to an I-77 widening project. That site was always meant to be temporary, according to city officials, but it will be another loss for the shelter.
How to help
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Animal Care & Control center offers adoptions, foster and staycation options for dogs, cats and other animals. All can be seen in person at the shelter, on its website and social media pages, and various community adoption events held throughout the year.
This story was originally published October 24, 2024 at 10:03 AM.
