Fans offer some relief to dogs at Wake shelter

Raleigh, N.C. — The extreme hot weather lingering over the Triangle is hard for those without air conditioning – including about 100 dogs at the Wake County Animal Care, Control & Adoption Center.

The dog kennel does not have air conditioning, so workers pulled out cooling fans this week. Those keep the kennel about 10 degrees cooler than outside, shelter officials said.

"It does help control the temperature," the shelter's director, Michael Williams, said. "It doesn't keep it at 72 degrees like air conditioning would, but it does help."

Some volunteers, though, claim the situation requires immediate action.

"The more heat you have in the kennels, the more diseases you're going to spread, and the more animals, dogs, you're going to put down," volunteer June Fail said. "The smell is unbearable."

The shelter will soon become more crowded, as its intake usually doubles over the summer.

Williams said no animal has died from the heat during the 12 years he has been at the shelter.

"They are bred and designed to be outside in the heat. Their bodies are able to take that," he said.

Permanent relief for the dog kennels might come in Wake County's proposed budget. It sets aside $2.3 million to install a cooling system in the dog kennels and to expand the shelter.

Fail urged the Wake County Board of Commissioners to pass the proposed budget.

"The county commissioners need to fund us because we need some help," Fail said.

Proposed improvements to the shelter will be completed in 2010.

Williams said the expansion is necessary, in part, because the shelter will start taking pets from Garner and possibly Cary, starting in July.