Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Chicago Animal Care and Control (CACC) Executive Direct Kelley Gandurski today announced new investments as part of the 2019 budget to renovate the shelter’s medical facility and strengthen medical care. The new project will allow the shelter’s medical practice to more efficiently and effectively treat CACC’s animals to support the adoption, transfer and rescue of shelter pets. 

“This renovation will advance the Department’s efforts to provide more life-saving care to critically ill or injured animals and prepare more animals for forever-homes,” said Mayor Emanuel. “To strengthen operational efficiency and save more animals, it is important to keep our City Shelter up to industry standards and properly equipped.”

In January, a complete renovation of the medical and surgery areas will begin on the existing medical facility, which is more than 20 years old. The will include electrical structural and mechanical updates to the prep, triage, surgery, recovery, and exam rooms. The medical renovation will also include an essential isolation area that will help reduce the transmission of infectious disease to other animals. As a result, CACC’s medical facility will modernize the existing space to allow more efficiency and the capability of housing state-of-the-art medical equipment.

“The entire project will allow CACC’s medical staff to more readily assess critical patients and expand CACC’s means of care for animals,” said Executive Director Kelley Gandurski. “This will ultimately lead to more animals being rescued or adopted. We’re grateful for the enormous community support to enhance these efforts that will surely help us continue to reduce the population of animals in the shelter as they move even more quickly to our rescue partners or to adoptive homes.”

CACC is partnering with the University of Illinois to host veterinary medical students to assist with providing additional care to shelter animals. The renovation of the medical and surgery suite will educate future veterinarians while the shelter will benefit from additional help to treat animals.

The Department of Fleet and Facility Management is managing the improvements using existing City contracts. The renovation is estimated to cost $1.5 million.

Friends of Chicago Animal Care and Control, CACC’s non-profit partner, has committed to providing a capital fundraising contribution. The funding will support the procurement of new medical equipment to be housed in CACC’s medical facility once the renovations are completed. The new medical equipment will provide CACC with the capability to more quickly assess at-risk animals and provide effective medical treatment in-house.

This investment builds on CACC’s efforts to strengthen medical care at the shelter. This summer, CACC received a donation of heartworm treatment to treat CACC’s heartworm-positive dogs. Prior to this, heartworm-positive dogs were not treated until they were transferred to a rescue partner. In addition, PAWS Chicago is co-locating one of their veterinarians at the shelter who assists with surgery on a weekly basis to help prep more animals for adoption and rescue.

PHOTOS: Images of dogs and cats treated in CACC’s medical facility available upon request by emailing Jennifer.Schlueter@cityofchicago.org.

CACC is the city’s only municipally-run, open-admission animal shelter, open to the public 365 days of the year. Its mission is to protect public safety and promote the humane care of animals through sheltering, pet placement, education and animal law enforcement. During its business hours, CACC impounds stray, owner-surrendered and confiscated animals, as well as wildlife.

For more information about CACC, please visit CityofChicago.org/CACC.

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