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Dear Mayor Kelly and Commissioners
As a donor and a citizen who has worked hard at promoting the HUG (Help Us Grow) project for the Great Falls Animal Shelter, I am deeply disappointed in the decision to postpone the approval of the bid to Detailed Construction. This decision will ultimately loose the current bid, which is $98,000 less than the last bid that was rejected in May of 2018. Then it would cost even more to go back out to bid.
It is public knowledge that Commissioner Robinson was the former Board Director for the Maclean-Cameron Animal Adoption Center, and donated $250,000 to help pay off any debt, for those reasons alone he should recluse himself from the situation. Due to the conflict of interest with Commissioner Robinson, there should be a re-vote at the next meeting. He stated at the meeting on April 2, 2019 that he regrets that the two initiatives came at the same time, when in fact his initiative came in the middle of the Shelter’s initiative, since they have been working on the bidding process since 2018. Commissioner Robinson’s only concern is the Maclean and NOT the City Shelter has he refers to as “they” or “them”, which tells me he does not see the City Shelter as part of the City that he represents.
The MCAAC is a private organization and has the right to turn animals away; which the City Shelter is an open municipal shelter and doesn’t have that option. The City Shelter will take in the abused, sick, old or behaviorally challenged. The City Shelter takes in many animals that the MCAAC has turned away, because those animals are sick, old, injured or they don’t have a perfect temperament. The Shelter then nurses that animal back to health or provides it with the necessary medical care or training so that animal will have a second chance at life. According to Commissioner Mary Moe and Commissioner Robinson, they duplicate services and don’t see the point in having both in operation. Why would the City of Great Falls then have Benefis and Great Falls Clinic, or have 11 Veterinarians in the city limits? Each clinic has their strengths and weaknesses, as does the City Shelter and the Maclean. The Shelter may not be a state of the art building, but their compassion and care for the animals are state of the art.
I strongly believe Commissioner Bronson when he stated that he feared the end result will create an atmosphere of confrontation. The thousand of people who have made a donation to the HUG Project, made there donation specifically to see the remodel happen to the Great Falls Animal Shelter not the Maclean. The bid from Detailed Construction may not come back around again if not accepted. Please don’t make the past 6 years of hard work of raising those funds a waste of time.

Thank you for your time