Support sought for new animal shelter in Curtis Park

Young Legends FINGAL has dominated this year’s North Coast and Northern Region Keep Australia Beautiful NSW Clean Beaches Awards. The town will find out tomorrow if they will become the second Tweed Coast Beach in three years to win the overall NSW title when the state awards are announced at South Maroubra Beach. Maggies Beach at Cabarita took out the NSW title in 2011. Despite damaging erosion earlier in the year that threaten the local surf club, the Fingal Head Beach has bounced back to win the Overall title at the regional awards in Ballina last Friday. Fingal Head also took out the Young Legends award, for the local schools work to protect the environment, as well as the Evironmental Protection Award and were highly commended in the Cultural and Historical Heritage, Safety and Services, Litter & Waste Management and Community Partnerships Award. Cabarita Beach was also a big winner at the ceremony winning the Safety and Services, Litter & Waste Management and Community Partnerships Award, and being named Highly Commended in the Young Legends Award. The Keep Australia Beautiful NSW Clean Beaches - Connecting our Coast Awards encourage and recognise coastal communities, local councils, volunteers and surf lifesaving clubs who protect this State’s beautiful coastline. The program empowers these groups to actively work for a cleaner, more sustainable environment through the sharing of knowledge, experience and resources. Dune and habitat conservation, environmental education, anti-litter, waste management and visitor friendly initiatives are among some of the projects that are awarded. The Fingal Public School children have now made the State final two out of the past three years (as well as being highly commended in the 2012 regional awards). “We have been helping the Fingal Head Coastcare keep the area nice and clean,” School captain Indigo Jorgensen said. “This year we have been busy planting new plants on the dunes.” She said the dunes were slowly coming back after the devastation of earlier in the year. Fingal Head received the Overall Award for the North Coast and Northern Rivers region for their impressive all round work including: Re-establishing a littoral rainforest environment adjacent to wetlands and dunes degraded since the 1950's and 1960's. Gradually the landscape has been transformed from a wasteland to a balance ecosystem with the help of local community groups, Tweed Shire Council and various organisations. Rehabilitating dunes, surrounding forests and wetlands as an important habitat for many native animals. The number of bird species recorded in these regenerated forests has increased from 28 in 1960 to 238 species in 2013, these includes endangered, threatened, migratory and sea birds. Fingal Head Coastcare has a long term commitment of 28 years to re-establish and protect the coastal/dune biodiversity. Keep Australia Beautiful NSW CEO, David Imrie, commended Fingal Head and each of the award winners for their fantastic environmental achievements. “Through the Clean Beaches Program we celebrate the achievements of coastal communities who actively make our beaches cleaner and a more sustainable environment’, said Mr. Imrie. “We congratulate Fingal Head and each of the regional winners who have set an impressive benchmark for the rest of the competition.

THROUGH the combined efforts of the Armidale branch of the RSPCA and the council’s Companion Animals Shelter, Armidale has an enviable record in saving the lives of lost or abandoned pets.
One of the key strategies to place homeless animals has been the RSPCA’s monthly Adopt a Pet days in Curtis Park and a website (www.adoptapet.com.au) where pets needing homes are featured.
However, at the moment the Adopt a Pet Day is itself facing homelessness unless sufficient funds are raised to build a new multi-purpose facility as a base in Curtis Park.
Complaints to the council that the RSPCA should stop using a popular picnic shelter, just below the Visitor Information Centre, have created the predicament.
The council is donating $9000 towards the new shelter, Cr Andrew Murat has drawn up plans free of charge and other groups in the community including BackTrack YouthWorks will provide some volunteer labour for the construction. Also New England Mutual has stepped in with a $4000 donation and a further $2000 if RSPCA members and their supporters register a further 100 votes for the idea on the www.heartofourcommunity.com.au website.
Companion Animals Shelter manager Phil Evans said that over the last year only 58 of the 551 cats and dogs landing at the shelter had been euthanased showing a continuing decline due to the increased work towards rehousing abandoned and stray animals. Of those euthanased most had been either killed or severely injured by vehicles or because of temperament or health concerns.
He said the council website (http://armidaleanimalshelter.blogspot.com.au/) is updated two or three times a day and as a result animals had been shipped around Australia including to Hobart and Perth.
Armidale branch RSPCA co-ordinator Caroline Girvin said around 200 animals each year including dogs, cats, guinea pigs and rabbits found a home through the Adopt a Pet Days which have been held each month for the last 15 years. “The cost of the new shelter is around $20,000 including the slab but we will be relying on a lot of volunteer labour and with $15,000 we could start work almost immediately,” she said.
Those wishing to support the project should go to www.heartofourcommunity.com.au and register by selecting ‘join in’ at the top of the home page. To vote, find the idea by searching for “RSPCA”, and then click the “Vote” button located under the main image on the left hand side.

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