SNOW HILL — It’s a tough job, but somebody has to do it. Or in the case of the Greene County Animal Shelter, nobody will be doing it.
After Sept. 19, there will no longer be an active employee at the animal shelter in Snow Hill. But health regulations require the county to handle rabies and dog bite calls.
Gayle Joyner, the shelter attendant and only employee able to work for the time being, turned her resignation in to the Greene County Health Department on Sept. 5.
“I have no choice in this matter simply due to my salary,” she wrote in her resignation letter. “I work at least 50 hours a week and do (three) jobs. No one can live on ($)20,000 a year. I truly believe I have (made) a difference in the shelter and was hoping the county authorities would recognize and things would turn around …”
Sheri Taylor, animal control advisory board president, said Joyner even worked on the county furlough days because someone had to feed the animals twice a day.
Dr. Ivey Smith, the county veterinarian, spoke with emotion to the county commissioners on Monday night, with about 40 citizens in attendance.
“The biggest issue — one of the most difficult ones for this county at this time — is we need to have two animal control officers and a person to staff the facility in order to accomplish what I consider is a minimum for the shelter, in terms of providing public safety for this county and,” Smith said, pausing to hold back tears, “the care these animals deserve. … I can’t believe you don’t understand or don’t care — I don’t know which it is — about taking care of animals in this county.”
Health Director Michael Rhodes offered three options for the board to consider.
“One of them is that the county close the shelter and only do work and public health as it relates to rabies,” he said. “That would still probably require an animal control officer to be on staff to do canvassing for rabies vaccinations, rabies clinics, also be involved in picking up dogs that bite and transferring them to clinics that have been contracted to take care of them, like kennels and things like that.”
Rhodes said a second option would be to close the shelter temporarily. Either way, the animals currently in the shelter would have to be adopted, sent to rescue groups or transferred to another shelter.
“I think it’s a disgrace,” Joyner said on Wednesday about the way county employees are being treated. “And I think that the shelter will not reopen. That’s my opinion.”
Joyner said SPCA employees from Wake County will be coming next week to pick up any animals not adopted out over the weekend or taken by rescue groups.
Earlier in the meeting during public comments, Tammy Everette, from the Lenoir County Animal Shelter, offered to take the animals from Greene County and bring them to Lenoir. But Rhodes said she later told him there is no room at the Lenoir shelter, but she would help find homes for the animals.
Rhodes met with a regional American SPCA representative on Tuesday about placing some of the animals with rescue groups.
The only animal control officer, Randy Hawkins, was injured in a wreck while off duty sometime around February, and at the shelter from an incinerator explosion on April 10. He is still recovering from the injuries.
Rhodes said he hopes Hawkins will be able to return to his job, but with the second option, the county needs to look at the salary for three positions, as well as advertising.
“But unless we hire somebody that has experience in the next week or so,” Rhodes said, “we’re not going to be able to have an animal control officer in the field.”
Smith said the board lacks an understanding of its own expectations of animal control, and the advisory board doesn’t have the authority to set the standards.
“Part of the problem is a lack of appreciation and understanding on the part of the board,” Smith said, “of the job that’s required of our animal control officers.”
He also said the board hasn’t taken advantage of revenues, such as collecting the fee on the tax form for owning a dog.
The third option would be to transfer the remaining funds in the animal control budget, currently at about $105,000, and the positions be transferred to the sheriff’s department.
Sheriff Lemmie Smith said in a telephone interview on Tuesday his department doesn’t have the manpower.
“I’ve got enough to manage,” he said. “… We’re going to have to play it by ear and do the best we can.”
His department currently handles certain types of calls when Joyner is not available, but no one in the Sheriff’s Office is certified to handle rabies, nor can they house animals that require quarantine.
Rhodes said the volunteers are a large help, but the shelter still needs a paid employee to coordinate their hours.
There were several comments made by the animal advisory board members and volunteers.
Commissioner Jerry Jones asked which option was preferable to the advisory board. Rhodes said the temporary closing would be the best choice, “but it’s got to be funded properly.”
“I support No. 2,” Taylor said. “… and I really don’t think it’s fair to throw animal control to the sheriff’s department. They’re already understaffed as it is.”
When the animal shelter ran out of funds last fiscal year, the community raised funds to purchase food and other supplies, she said.
“If you look at fundraising and stuff that has been done to try to help the county so it wouldn’t cost the county so much,” Taylor said, “I think that speaks a lot for what we all want.”
Margaret Fisher can be reached at 252-559-1082 or Margaret.Fisher@Kinston.com. Follow her on Twitter @MargaretFishr