Centralia City Manager Galen Mahle doesn’t want to pursue a new agreement with Marion County to house the county’s dogs due to other priorities.
Mahle met with Marion County Board Chair Steve Whritenour and Community Relations Committee Chair Tracy Murray on Friday where he announced his decision.
“When the agreement did not get renewed at the end of last year, we made some changes,” Mahle said. “We actually had the retirement of our full-time animal shelter manager, who we’ve only replaced with a part-timer. We really aren’t adequately staffed to take on a contract like what we had with the county before, because it would just fill our shelter too large for the staffing that we have set aside now.”
Mahle says while the county board had complaints of room not being available for its dogs when ending the old contract, he reports the same thing was happening with dogs picked up by the city.
“We’re going to be able to rely more heavily on the control we can have for Centralia dogs and making sure that we are fulfilling the obligation that our animal shelter and our animal control department has here in the city.”
Mahle says it’s possible the situation could be looked again at sometime in the future.
Whritenour declined to comment after the meeting, but said the issue would be discussed at the County and Community meeting at 5:30 Tuesday at the courthouse. The committee had earlier discussed building their own facility if something couldn’t be worked out with Centralia. The Salem City Manager Annette Sola earlier told the county board they were not interested in working with them on holding dogs picked up by the county.
