(Photos by Chris Boyle)
After a run-in with the Town of Oyster Bay that resulted in their temporary closure, a Massapequa animal shelter is—much like the little critters they take care of on a daily basis—getting a second lease on life.
All About Spay Neuter is a publicly-funded, not-for-profit cat and kitten rescue shelter located at 4209 Merrick Rd. since October of 2013. According to owner and animal lover Joanne Monez of Massapequa, helping cats is an important job that she’s been doing for the past 12 years because—simply put—no one else does it.
“We trap wild, feral cats, spay or neuter them and return them to their colonies to help control the local population,” said Monez. “Along the way, we find friendly adult cats and kittens on the street—including ones with special needs—and we socialize them and eventually put them up for adoption.”
A wide-open space filled with numerous cats both in cages and loose, All About Spay Neuter has trapping contracts with both the towns of Hempstead and Oyster Bay, and a thriving amount of volunteers helping out. All was going well until a dispute with a neighboring business—Reliance Healthcare Staffing at 4211 Merrick Rd.—sparked a chain of events that eventually led to the shelter shuttering its doors for a spell.
“Next door was complaining about a strong ‘animal’ odor from here that was getting into their offices,” said Monez. “I noticed it myself, so we went out and bought air purifiers and even lent the busin
ess next door some, but they weren’t satisfied with that, so they kept complaining to the town until they came and shut us down on July 17, 2014.”
Volunteer Carol Clark admits that their neighbor had a legitimate problem with the shelter. She nonetheless said that the Town of Oyster Bay took their scrutiny of All About Spay Neuter a little too far, stating that some of their findings bordered on nit-picking.
“The town stated that we needed a new, $25,000 air filtration system put in, which we agreed to do,” said Clark. “However, some of the other things they had a problem with like the fact that we didn’t have proper exit door signage, we didn’t have a push bar on the back door, nothing of any real substance, and all things that were easily fixed.”
Nonetheless, the big problem, which was the expensive air filtration system, was out of Monez’s budget, so the town shut down All About Spay Neuter until they could find the financial backing to get up to code. After finding temporary foster families to care for their stock of nearly 80 cats and kittens, Monez set about generating the money needed to re-open her doors via grants and intensive fundraising efforts. In the end, they raised more than $35,000, and after extensive work, the shelter re-opened its doors on Saturday, Dec. 13.
“We used $25,000 of the money to purchase the air purification system,” said Monez. “The rest went to electricians, attorneys, gas conversion since the new air system runs on gas, the ceiling re-done, new lights, exit signs, doors and labor. The money went fast.”
Dana Arnone, owner of Reliance Healthcare Staffing, cited the strong animal smells coming from the cat shelter that she and her employees were forced to deal with on a daily basis as the main reasons for her complaint against them to the town. However, Arnone said that she’s already noticed a big improvement from next door, and wished to convey that the issues she had with her neighbor were never personal.
“I never thought their being there was a bad thing,” said Arnone. “As long as the odors stay away and they’re taking care of the cats the way that they’re supposed to be, and the filtration system doesn’t affect the neighboring stores, I would never have a problem with them being there. It’s day three since they re-opened, and so far, so good. I hope everything continues the way it’s going now, and if it does, everything should be fine.”
However, during construction, Monez stated that large holes were discovered in the wall separating the shelter from Reliance Healthcare Staffing; holes that were far more likely to be the culprit in transmitting foul smells than the lack of an air filtration system. But Monez isn’t holding a grudge. Instead, she is moving forward with the work she and her volunteers are intensely passionate about.
“We probably wasted both money and time because of that and we could have just patched up those holes if we knew about them,” she said. “But now we’re open again and even while we were closed, my volunteers and I were still out rescuing cats and kittens in the area. It’s not something we stopped doing just because the shelter was closed.”
The good news is that the re-opening of All About Spay Neuter has provided a number of fuzzy felines that otherwise might have died on the street a chance to find their “forever homes.” For example, Ann Sullivan of Garden City simply couldn’t put down an adorable little puffball of a kitten that she and her daughter had decided to adopt.
“My daughter wanted a kitten, but all we kept finding everywhere we looked were big, full-grown cats. But this little one fits the bill,” said Sullivan. “I think this place is wonderful and that they’re doing a great job. This is one of the nicest, most friendly places that we’ve been to.”
For more information on All About Spay Neuter Inc., visit the shelter at 4209 Merrick Rd., Massapequa or visit www.allaboutspayneuter.com.
