City Council OKs boost in funding for SPCA services

The City Council has unanimously agreed that Charlottesville should boost its funding to the area SPCA for its pound services.

The new contract between the city and the local Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals will bump up its funding to $4 per capita, or the cost per resident, in fiscal 2011, which begins July 1, and $5 per capita in fiscal 2012.

Councilors voted on the contract late Monday, and they said they would also work with the SPCA on an agreement to increase spaying and neutering efforts.

Government officials recently said they did not know from where the additional funding would come if local revenues remain down.

The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors is expected to vote on the same pound services contract at its meeting today.

The city and county governments for the past several months have been renegotiating their contract with the SPCA, which was asking the localities to bump up their funding from roughly $1.60 per capita to between $4 and $7 per capita. The latter figures are what the SPCA cited as an industry standard for providing pound services.

This year, the city will pay the SPCA $86,000. The new formula means that in fiscal 2011 and fiscal 2012, city funding will increase to $166,000 and $207,500, respectively.

For the county, the totals would increase from $248,106 this year to $369,248 in fiscal 2011 and $471,560 in fiscal 2012.

Fourth sister city

Councilors on Monday night also unanimously supported adding Winneba, Ghana, as a Charlottesville sister city.

Winneba would be the city’s fourth sister city and the first in Africa. The others are Poggio a Caiano, Italy; Besancon, France; and Pleven, Bulgaria.

A Charlottesville delegation participated in a privately funded trip to Winneba last spring to explore developing exchanges between the two cities.