It isn’t unusual for wealthy pet owners to lavish their dogs and cats with spa days, air-conditioned dog houses and bejeweled collars.
Even working-class stiffs will adjust budgets to splurge on doggie day care or high-quality food.
But heated flooring, kitty condos and skylights for strays? The city’s lost, homeless and unwanted pets will now experience these luxuries, as well as on-site modern surgical facilities, outdoor play areas and pet visitation rooms while waiting for adoption at the new eco-friendly Denver Animal Shelter.
A $17 million bond — $10.5 million of which was for construction — paid for the new shelter, at 1241 W. Bayaud Ave. At just less than 36,000 square feet, it is nearly triple the size of the old structure.
That’s a lot of dough for some pound puppies — about $300 a square foot.
But shelter designers say that it isn’t out of line for a municipal facility that needs to last 50 years. Denver’s shelter updated the amenities and features to what are now standards in the animal-health and -welfare industry.
Shelter staff members say that in addition to giving unwanted pets a new lease on life, the facility is helping upgrade its image from cager to caretaker.
“Municipal shelters can’t be pounds anymore,” says Doug Kelley, director of the shelter and Denver Animal Care and Control. “The expectation is to get them into a new home.”
The best way to increase adoptions is to create an environment that keeps its occupants healthy and less stressed.
“Anything done with design of a building that allows animals to show a more typical range of normal behavior without hiding, barking or meowing or aggression will make that animal more likely to be adopted,” says Suzanne Hetts, a certified applied animal behaviorist and co-owner of the Littleton- based Animal Behavior Associates.
Built in 1972, the old shelter, a mile away on Jason Street, had few windows, dark interiors with nondescript cold gray paint and cramped spaces. Animals had to be transferred out of the old shelter to get spayed or neutered. But the new shelter has an on-site surgery suite complete with tables, prep and lab area, pre- and post-operation rooms and windows to allow the public to watch procedures being done. Pressurized airflow prevents contaminated air from flowing out of isolation rooms.
In the old shelter, the staff had to step into bleach foot baths when coming out of the single isolation room to prevent tracking out disease. In the new shelter, there is an entire medical ward with dog kennels, cat rooms and multiple spaces to isolate sick animals from healthy ones.
Some rooms did double and triple duty in the old facility — for example the so called “treatment room” was the same space for medical and behavior assessments, grooming and euthanasia.
“Working with aggressive, mean or unwanted animals that would likely be euthanized in such a dark, dingy bunker was a real psychological toil for staff,” said Kevin Fitzgerald, a staff veterinarian at VCA Alameda East.
And emotions ran high in the general lobby, where adoptions, lost and found and surrenders were all addressed in the same space.
Kelley said there were people who were happy to be adopting a new family member in the same room with owners of sick or dying animals, with still others who were angry that their pit bulls had been confiscated.
The new shelter features separate service lobbies and can house up to 26 percent more animals. Larger kennels can be divided during heavy influx periods, such as a hoarding case or natural disaster. Outdoor exercise spaces and “real life” pet visitation rooms are new amenities.
“There is no comparison,” says John Sanchez, who visited with a dog he hoped to adopt as a playmate for a terrier he rescued from the old shelter years ago.
Cat condos include four separate living areas, while a cat colony room allows felines to play and attract attention because cats are the least likely to be adopted or reclaimed when lost. A new space offers short-term housing for urban wildlife, including raptors, raccoons and snakes, while an outdoors barn houses horses, cattle, goats and the like.
The new shelter was built so animals stay for fewer days (making room for more animals in need) and are less likely to be euthanized, says Heather Lewis, project manager with Animal Arts.
The Boulder-based company, which specializes in veterinary-hospital and animal-shelter design, included dozens of green features to help the facility be certified with an LEED-NC Platinum rating — one of the few shelters in the country to have this coveted title.
Lewis said some of the same features that make the building more energy-efficient promote wellness for people and pets. For example, 37 skylights throughout the complex provide soothing natural light and save on electric bills. Radiant heated floors in the dog kennels provide comfort, warmth and health benefits.
The shelter’s greenest claim to fame is saving 30 percent over the industry baseline in energy costs, largely from using evaporate cooling and a recovery ventilation system.
Over the years, the bleak old shelter made it difficult to shed the negative association with dogcatchers and euthanasia. But directors and staff hope the cheery atmosphere and new features will make it a community destination.
“People went to the old shelter because they felt sorry for the animals,” says Kelley. “We want people to come to the new shelter and hang out on a Saturday.”
Sheba R. Wheeler: 303-954-1283 or swheeler@denverpost.com
INFO: Denver Animal Shelter, 1241 W. Bayaud Ave, Denver, CO 80223. Dial 311 (or if calling from out of town, 720-913-1311) to reach the shelter. Contact Animal Care and Control staff at 720-337-1800; .
