- By Dan Veaner
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Last year the cost to Lansing for dog control rose by 50% to $32,499. This year it could rise as much as an additional 74% if Lansing accepts a proposal to maintain services. An alternative proposal subtracts emergency veterinary care from that contract with a price rise to $29,790, or 60.05%. Or the Town could choose a proposal for $18,600 from Country Acres, a Homer based shelter.
SPCA Executive Director Abigail Smith
Lansing, Ithaca, and Dryden are all facing price rises, while Caroline, Enfield, and Newfield are seeing drops. "What we did was to follow the national model," SPCA Executive Director Abigail Smith said. "We looked at the per capita rate, meaning it's a certain cost per person. So the larger the population in your particular area, the more it would cost."
Speakers questioned whether Country Acres would provide the quantity and quality of services they say the SPCA offers, and asked how a for-profit shelter could possibly provide the same services for half the cost that the SPCA says it expends. They noted that dog control serves the whole community, not just pet owners. And they said that contracting with a shelter in Cortland County will send local tax dollars out of Tompkins County.
 Lansing Town Board (Left to right) Supervisor Scott Pinney, Deputy Supervisor Connie Wilcox, Marty Christopher, Matt Besemer, Bud Shattuck |
"The SPCA doesn't just serve pet owners," said Lansing resident Amanda Steinhardt, who recently became an SPCA board member. "It serves the entire population. As a community we should be supporting the SPCA. We can pull out like Groton did. Ithaca can pull out, and every other community can pull out based on cost, and then maybe we won't have an SPCA."
A number of residents said that cat services would disappear if the SPCA were to lose the contract, but board members noted that the Town only contracts for dog control. Supervisor Scott Pinney said that he thought that Tompkins County contracts separately for cat control. When resident Alyssa Fontaine suggested that Lansing would be sponging off the other communities in the county if Lansing drops the SPCA Pinney noted that we all pay county taxes and are entitled to services Tompkins County provides.
Smith clarified that. "The county has historically supported a cat control program," she explained. "It by no means is comprehensive service provision. As you know no cat control is mandated by municipal or State law. We are able to respond to emergencies because we have officers in the field in that area. If they are not in the field in that area we wouldn't be able to send an officer to a town we don't serve to provide emergency services like that. That is something that would be at risk."
Scott Pinney
She said the contract provides services for feral cats, which the County views as a health and safety issue. The service provides vaccination and neutering for feral cats, rather than emergency services for injured cats.
Many of the speakers, including board members, relayed anecdotes about how the SPCA has served them. But board members explained that they are responsible to represent all residents, including people without pets. They said that they frequently receive calls from residents who are concerned about rising taxes along with the calls from SPCA supporters.
"We support all of the people in the town," said Councilman Bud Shattuck. "Many of them have children and many of them are now struggling to support those children. I really look at this as a tough thing to decide. It is a financial question. Someone said, 'can you look at this and say you are going to base it just on the bottom dollar?' It could be if we come down to the decision, saying, do we tell people in the town they're going to spend the money on their tax which we made choices for, or their children which you really have no choices for. We really need to support them completely."
"Yes, it's going up, but the nominal cost is less than a gallon of gas." Steinhardt said. "It's less than a gallon of milk. It's less than an ice cream cone."
"We really do have to look at the bottom line," said Deputy Supervisor Connie Wilcox. " When gas is over three dollars a gallon and milk is over three dollars a gallon, maybe $2.75 isn't much, but it is to a lot of people."
"When we did our budget last year $18,000 was 1% of your taxes," Shattuck noted. "Your taxes went up 3% last year. This would have made your taxes go up 3.8%. When you figure that for has someone that has a $500,000 home that's a lofty amount. It's a lofty amount for someone who has less. Again I look at the price of gas and everything else that is effecting families. I haven't made a decision, but I want you to know that's how I have to look at this. I think our board has to look at it in the same way."
A number of people said they had requested copies of the two proposals so they could see for themselves what they contain and how they compare, but they were denied. Pinney explained that releasing them to the public during the negotiation would hurt the Town's ability to negotiate a better deal. But after everyone had spoken he polled the Board.
"I have reviewed both of the proposals and I think the SPCA and Country Acres have done a very good job of putting them together," he said. "We have two very good proposals, and I don't feel at this time that we have any need to renegotiate either one of them. If we agree not to negotiate them any further I would like to put these out to the public."
Board members agreed, and provided what copies they had to those who wanted them, promising to make more available in the Town Clerk's office Thursday morning, and to post them on the Town Web site within a few days.
"How as a town do we discuss something like this," Shattuck asked. "When we buy equipment we have a choice of trucks, and we get bids. Maybe the Ford truck is automatic and it's $17,000 and a Dodge truck is standard and it's $14,000. We say how long are they going to last and what do we need them for? Quite often we'll go with that lower bid."
"We're going to be facing the budget hearing in the next few months," said Councilman Marty Christopher. "We're going to be looking at every penny closer this year than we have in the past."
But all the board members said their minds are not made up, and Pinney stressed that they want more input before deciding on a contract in the September Town Board meeting.
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