The Grant County Humane Society wants to move from Lancaster to Platteville.
The Humane Society has an accepted offer for the currently vacant building at 500 E. Business 151 in Platteville.
The purchase is subject to two conditions: Raising $1.1 million to $1.2 million of the $1.7 million cost, half by summer and half by the end of the year.
A change in City of Platteville ordinances to allow a larger number of animals to stay at the facility.
The Platteville site should allow for more animals on site, and be more convenient for volunteers, many of whom are UW–Platteville students who sometimes have difficulty getting to Lancaster.
“We had been looking in Platteville before our little spot in Lancaster showed up,’ said Lancaster veterinarian Cari Schaffer, president of the Grant County Humane Society. “We’d been looking in a lot of different places and didn’t find anything appropriate.”
Schaffer said the Platteville site combines “more space, more access and less money.”
The Humane Society has been located at the Lancaster Veterinary Clinic at 222 S.
Roosevelt St. since 2014. It was designed for six dogs and six cats, but Schaffer said the facility now has 14 dogs and nine cats. The Humane Society takes in 2,500 animals per year, and “We have to turn away animals every day,” she said.
There had been a proposal to build a new Humane Society facility in the Arrow Ridge Business Park in Lancaster, but Schaffer said the proposed lot had decreased in size and was no longer viable there. There also had been a proposal to build in Lancaster’s Schacht Field a Humane Society building as well as a new facility for the Maple Street Kids daycare, whose lease with the Lancaster Community School District expires June 30, with the school district planning to raze the former Lancaster Middle School building.
The proposed combination daycare/Humane Society building project was estimated at $5 million based on a construction cost of $250 per square foot. It also would have delayed a new home for the Humane Society, because the proposal would have built the daycare facility first within the next two years.
Platteville may not be central in Grant County, but it is more central for other areas of the Tri-States. Lafayette County has no humane society, and Schaffer said the Grant County Humane Society now gets animal surrenders from Galena, even though there is an animal shelter in Elizabeth, Ill., and a humane society in Dubuque.
"It's also more centrally located if we want to work with Lafayette and Iowa counties," she said. UW–Platteville is a source of many of the Humane Society’s volunteers.
“We have a university there where they have a lot of ag and animal-focused curriculums that align well together,” said Schaffer, who added that UWP students who don’t’ have their own cars have difficulty getting to Lancaster to volunteer.
The project, including the building purchase and renovations, is estimated at $1.7 million. The Humane Society has $540,000 dedicated to the project now. The group wants to raise $300,000 to $400,000 by May 1, another $400,000 this summer to allow construction to begin, and an additional $400,000 by the end of the year to hire staff, including a full-time director and a part-time position to coordinate volunteers among other duties. The goal is to open Jan. 1.
"It's not going to open until we have the money,” said Schaffer.
The group has submitted grant applications, and hopes to be able to access the City of Platteville’s Freudenreich Animal Care Trust Fund, which had about $150,000 in principal available as of Jan. 31 according to city records.
The fund was the creation of Georgeanne Freudenreich, who donated in her will the money for the creation of an animal shelter. The fund, created in 1992, is administered by the Community Foundation of Southern Wisconsin with terms that the principal balance can be spent for “major animal related expenses” with a twothirds vote of the Common Council.
The Freudenreich Animal Care Trust Fund Committee favors donating the funds to the Grant County Humane Society, which would then terminate the fund, according to city records.
The Common Council was scheduled to discuss the Humane Society request as an Information and Discussion item at its meeting Tuesday.
The move will not affect the Humane Society’s status as a Grant County organization, and will not affect the Lancaster Veterinary Clinic, Schaffer said.
The East Business 151 building was the site of Grizzly Flats, a roller skating rink owned by Richard Brockman, who owned The Platteville Journal for 32 years. It also was the home of American Customer Care before the COVID-19 pandemic and its employees’ working from home instead of in a building.
City ordinances presently allow no more dogs and/or cats than eight at least five months old in a residence. City ordinances also require a private kennel license for owners of more than four dogs, and a business kennel license for dog breeders or kennels.
Donations for the project may be sent to the Grant County Humane Society, 222 S. Roosevelt St., Lancaster, WI 53813. There also will be donation opportunities linked on the Grant County Humane Society Facebook page.
David Timmerman of the Grant County Herald Independent in Lancaster contributed to this story.
