Call for shelter volunteers
San Pedro now has a spanking new animal shelter.
It's bigger and way nicer than the former facility, which was half a century old and cramped beyond reason.
But with the city of Los Angeles undergoing budget cuts, the shelter at 957 N. Gaffey St. is in need of your help.
Shelter volunteer Theresa Sardisco tells us there will be a meeting for prospective volunteers at 1 p.m. Saturday at the shelter. The new Harbor Volunteer Coordinator, Mercedes Grey, will be on hand to talk about the needs and how local volunteers can help.
Meanwhile, a Daily Breeze story has been published regarding the installation of a cooling misting system at the shelter. The misters, costing the city about $50,000, are expected to be in place by the first week of August.
"The misters are provided at other shelters," Kiran Vohra of the city's Bureau of Engineering explained to me in an email. "Because a climate study completed earlier indicated comparative milder weather in San Pedro for most days of the year, the misters were omitted for this shelter. However, maybe because of the micro-climatic conditions in different parts of San Pedro, it is currently determined that the misters will add to the comfort of the animals and the visitors." .
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About the Bloggers
Daily Breeze reporter Donna Littlejohn has shared her homes with a succession of wonderful, funny, and occasionally difficult canines -- Muffin, Fritz, Ellie, Mercy, Pilgrim and now Cowboy, an Australian shepherd-border collie, and Tess, a border collie. From strong-willed terriers to weirdly obsessed Australian shepherds, they've invaded her world with boundless energy, wet noses, muddy paws and soggy tennis balls. But they've really brought so much more than that -- like laughter and joy, some unexpected life lessons, and more than a few tears along the way.
E-mail Donna at donna.littlejohn@dailybreeze.com.
Josh Grossberg grew up with the usual array of animals: goldfish, dogs, hamsters, parakeets and turtles. He now owns the loudest dog in the South Bay(Video: Rocket the Dog) and is the least popular person on his block. He spends his free time in dog parks, pet shops and always has an extra plastic bag in his pocket just in case. He also has a cat.
E-mail Josh at josh.grossberg@dailybreeze.com.
Thank goodness they're putting in misters. I visited the shelter the week after it opened, and it was horribly hot outside. I actually used a Chinese umbrella to shade myself as I walked around, and the poor dogs had to huddle in the back of each run where a tiny amount of shade was available. The cement was scorching hot, I touched it myself to check. The dogs had a dilemma-- if they came to the chainlink end of their run to greet me and the other visitors (making them more adoptable, mind you) they would burn the bottoms of their feet! You'd see them run up to the chainlink fence, trying to say hi, and at the same time frantically shifting from foot to foot, and then running back to the shade after a moment when it just became too much. Hooray for misters! Can they install them any sooner? By the way, I found that if I held my umbrella just right, I could create a shade spot at the end of the run and the dog could actually stand there longer (though that cement doesn't cool off immediately).
So who do we contact at the shelter (phone number too?) to find out about volunteering if we can't make the meeting this weekend? I'm out of town. thank you!
Thanks for your willingness to volunteer. You can call Theresa Sardisco at 310-386-7932 or the Harbor Animal Care Center at 888-452-7381, Ext. 143.