Council will give Wildlife Center $4,000 it sought as Town's share
Action follows outcry from center supporters, residents
Service reinstated in town
By Nathan R. Huff
The first time the Town Council saw the funding request from the Wildlife Center of Silicon Valley, it was on a list of unfunded items in the staff's proposed town budget. And council members barely noticed. But following a concerted campaign by center supporters to make elected officials and Los Gatos residents aware of the implications of not providing the requested $3,949.50, council members wasted little time approving the same request on Sept. 20.
In fact, Councilman Randy Attaway asked that the funding request be moved off the "other business" calendar and onto the list of consent items. Once moved, the motion passed unanimously with no discussion.
Councilman Joe Pirzynski said after the meeting that it made sense to move the funding request to the consent agenda once the council understood the unique nature of the request--and had what he described as a clearer picture of the center's role, and a crystal-clear picture of its support base. "[Originally,] it was presented to us in a series of non-funded items and it didn't fall into any of the standard categories for grant money," Pirzynski said.
The nonprofit Wildlife Center of the Silicon Valley began in 1993 after the Humane Society closed its wildlife division; it treats close to 4,000 animals a year. The center has survived on membership dues and the work of volunteers, some of whom work at its Senter Road site in San Jose, and others of whom take injured and orphaned animal into their homes for care. Some volunteers spend up to several hundred dollars a month of their own money on food, medication and veterinarian costs for the animals.
The center gets by on an annual budget of around $60,000 but would like to see that figure closer to $130,000. In February, Deborah Champion, the center's executive director, sent letters to the cities of Santa Clara, Cupertino, Saratoga, Campbell, San Jose, Milpitas, Sunnyvale and Los Gatos requesting that they come up with 60 percent of the center's proposed $131,650 budget. The figure was based on the number of animals cared for from each city. Los Gatos' contribution was 5 percent of the $78,990 that the cities were asked to fund.
Of the eight cities the center approached for funding, only Los Gatos, Milpitas and Sunnyvale failed to appropriate funding. Then Sunnyvale and Milpitas reversed their decision, leaving Los Gatos as the only community unwilling to pay its share for the center's efforts to rescue and care for injured wildlife. When the center later announced that, as a result of the town's unwillingness to participate, WCSV would no longer be able to accept wildlife from Los Gatos residents, town officials began to take some heat.
Local animal lovers and WCSV supporters wrote letters to the Los Gatos Weekly-Times and to council members protesting the town's lack of participation.
As a result of the Sept. 20 decision, the Wildlife Center's free services to Los Gatos will be reinstated. The nearly $4,000 allocation will also move the center one step closer to its funding goals. "I'm so thankful to the council for realizing the importance of what we're trying to do," Champion said.
Attaway said he moved the motion on to the council's consent agenda rather than have the many supporters in the audience go to the microphone to talk in favor of the funding, since many of these same people had already made a convincing case during their letter writing campaign. He said the initial funding request was rejected because the wildlife group didn't understand the funding process. "Once the information and education was provided, I felt we could fund them," Attaway said.
The center, with relocation funding from the city of San Jose, will soon be moving to a new location at Penitencia Creek Park in San Jose. There the center will continue its work rehabilitating and releasing injured hawks, owls, bobcats, raccoons and any other wild animals found in the area. While Champion said the city's contribution would not put them over the top, she hopes it will allow for the hiring of two part-time staff members, bringing the total paid staff up to three. She added that the council was very responsive to the issue when she approached them directly.
Los Gatos, California Since 1881
