If you go
• What: Green County Humane Society open house
• When: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 16
• Where: At the back of Pleasant View Complex, N3152 Wisconsin 81, past the buildings and barns.
MONROE - The Green County Humane Society is giving the community a glimpse this weekend of its new shelter, which will soon replace the society's current aging and inadequate quarters for area animals in need of a permanent home.
"We needed this," said Rachel Schardt, GCHS spokesperson. Construction on the new shelter, which is about four times the size of the current shelter, began earlier this year behind the Pleasant View Complex just northwest of Monroe off Wisconsin 81.
Schardt expects staff and volunteers will be able to move the animals to the new facility sometime in January.
"This is still a work in progress," she said. "We just want to be able to give people a taste."
At the society's current shelter on 6th Avenue, each cramped room serves multiple purposes. The laundry room is also the bathroom and the food storage area. Walls often mildew, and there is little space for dogs to run and play. The building is so small, any overflow of cats is kept in an old trailer sitting on the property.
The new shelter is a five-star hotel by comparison. Located on an L-shaped, 8 1/2-acre area, the 13,824-square-foot property has room for almost twice as many dogs and dozens more cats.
Instead of metal cages, cats will be kept in wooden cabinet-like "condos" built by T&J Custom Cabinetry of Monticello.
For the dogs, the shelter bought easy-to-clean kennels from The Mason Company, Leesburg, Ohio. Gates open on each side of the divided kennels - using a dogbone-shaped weight - and allow staff and volunteers to clean without displacing the animals. Pipes underneath the concrete floor heat the kennel area, while the rest of the shelter uses ventilated forced-air heat.
"Dogs like nice warm floors," Schardt said.
There are several large dog runs outdoors, plus an area for dogs to be outside under an overhang.
Cats, too, will be getting access to fresh air - Schardt said the shelter has a goal of putting in screened-in gazebos for the cats on the other side of the building.
Each room in the new shelter has no more than one or two purposes. In two "meet and greet" rooms, adopters can bring pets from home to interact with potential adoptees. There are also rooms for spaying and neutering, surgical prep, intake, isolation, laundry, food storage and prep areas, as well as a staff break room, showers, private and public bathrooms, offices, a gift shop and a spacious lobby.
A multipurpose room on the east side of the building can be used for staff trainings and community groups, Schardt said, but staff haven't yet determined its full potential.
In keeping with a goal of making the shelter as energy-efficient as possible, three rooms - kitten overflow and two isolation areas - have Solatube lights installed in the ceiling. These squares of natural outdoor light can be "dimmed" or "brightened" with a switch connected to mechanized shutters.
The new shelter has been years in the making, starting with research visits to other humane societies in the area, including Dubuque and the Fox Valley. Board president Paul Barrett even visited a shelter in Hawaii while he was on vacation.
A lot of research went into the project "before we pulled a blade out of the grass," he said.
The group solicited donations, with a goal of raising $950,000, to build and equip the new shelter.
Bruni-Miller Construction of Monroe oversaw the construction under the direction of architect Dave Haroldson and with other area businesses working as subcontractors - A1 Electric, Monroe Heat and Sheet Metal, Monroe Plumbing, Russell Rufer and Son Excavating, Lovelace Pump Company, Clarno Lumber and Double G Concrete.
"We needed this," said Rachel Schardt, GCHS spokesperson. Construction on the new shelter, which is about four times the size of the current shelter, began earlier this year behind the Pleasant View Complex just northwest of Monroe off Wisconsin 81.
Schardt expects staff and volunteers will be able to move the animals to the new facility sometime in January.
"This is still a work in progress," she said. "We just want to be able to give people a taste."
At the society's current shelter on 6th Avenue, each cramped room serves multiple purposes. The laundry room is also the bathroom and the food storage area. Walls often mildew, and there is little space for dogs to run and play. The building is so small, any overflow of cats is kept in an old trailer sitting on the property.
The new shelter is a five-star hotel by comparison. Located on an L-shaped, 8 1/2-acre area, the 13,824-square-foot property has room for almost twice as many dogs and dozens more cats.
Instead of metal cages, cats will be kept in wooden cabinet-like "condos" built by T&J Custom Cabinetry of Monticello.
For the dogs, the shelter bought easy-to-clean kennels from The Mason Company, Leesburg, Ohio. Gates open on each side of the divided kennels - using a dogbone-shaped weight - and allow staff and volunteers to clean without displacing the animals. Pipes underneath the concrete floor heat the kennel area, while the rest of the shelter uses ventilated forced-air heat.
"Dogs like nice warm floors," Schardt said.
There are several large dog runs outdoors, plus an area for dogs to be outside under an overhang.
Cats, too, will be getting access to fresh air - Schardt said the shelter has a goal of putting in screened-in gazebos for the cats on the other side of the building.
Each room in the new shelter has no more than one or two purposes. In two "meet and greet" rooms, adopters can bring pets from home to interact with potential adoptees. There are also rooms for spaying and neutering, surgical prep, intake, isolation, laundry, food storage and prep areas, as well as a staff break room, showers, private and public bathrooms, offices, a gift shop and a spacious lobby.
A multipurpose room on the east side of the building can be used for staff trainings and community groups, Schardt said, but staff haven't yet determined its full potential.
In keeping with a goal of making the shelter as energy-efficient as possible, three rooms - kitten overflow and two isolation areas - have Solatube lights installed in the ceiling. These squares of natural outdoor light can be "dimmed" or "brightened" with a switch connected to mechanized shutters.
The new shelter has been years in the making, starting with research visits to other humane societies in the area, including Dubuque and the Fox Valley. Board president Paul Barrett even visited a shelter in Hawaii while he was on vacation.
A lot of research went into the project "before we pulled a blade out of the grass," he said.
The group solicited donations, with a goal of raising $950,000, to build and equip the new shelter.
Bruni-Miller Construction of Monroe oversaw the construction under the direction of architect Dave Haroldson and with other area businesses working as subcontractors - A1 Electric, Monroe Heat and Sheet Metal, Monroe Plumbing, Russell Rufer and Son Excavating, Lovelace Pump Company, Clarno Lumber and Double G Concrete.