Kent Animal Shelter has welcomed its rescued dogs back to a newly completed state-of-the-art kennel and isolation center in Calverton
The new facilities replace the no-kill shelter’s almost 60-year-old concrete kennel on River Road, which had deteriorated and lacked many amenities expected in a modern animal shelter.
Improvements include expanded space for adult dogs — increasing from 25 to 36 enclosures — as well as two new puppy rooms, meet and greet/bonding rooms, grooming and veterinary check-up rooms, play yards, and a dedicated isolation center where dogs spend their first days in quarantine upon arrival.
To celebrate the new facility, Kent will host a grand reopening festival on Sept. 27 featuring food trucks, live music, raffles, and — of course — opportunities to meet dogs and learn about the adoption process.
“I’m really excited. It really is a beautiful new facility,“ said Pam Green, Kent’s longtime executive director. “Since we reopened, we’ve had a lot of adoptions. It’s been very busy. We started taking in new animals. We brought our animals back over from Westhampton, where we were keeping them for 14 months. It’s really exciting.”
The project cost the nonprofit shelter roughly $4.6 million, Green said during a tour of the new facility Thursday. The shelter needed to demolish its prior kennel to make space for the new one, as well as construct an environmentally safe on-site septic system for the campus, which abuts the Peconic River within the Long Island Pine Barrens.
Most of the funding came from private contributions, Green said. Kent also received roughly $350,000 from state and county grants, Green said. Maddie’s Fund, a nonprofit, contributed a donation in honor of the late Dr. John Andresen, the beloved Aquebogue veterinarian who co-founded the Mattituck-Laurel Veterinary Hospital.
For Green, the new kennel is the culmination of more than 25 years of advocacy. In recognition of her service, the isolation center was dedicated in her name.
“By building this, we have a facility now that can last for decades,” Green said, “that they can have for the future, and so we can rescue more homeless animals.”
RiverheadLOCAL photos by Alek Lewis
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