Niagara Falls City Council will meet on emergency animal shelter contract

City Council Chair James Perry has called a special meeting for 6 p.m. Tuesday to act on a request by Mayor Robert Restaino to approve a contract for a vendor to provide temporary dog sheltering services for the city.
The city was scheduled to open and review bids for the proposed contract on late Friday afternoon. The results of the bid opening were not immediately available.
A Request For Proposals was made public March 18. The RFP calls for the vendor to provide shelter services from April 28 to Dec. 31, with an option to extend the contract 'until a city owned dog shelter is fully operational.'
The need for a temporary dog shelter service provider was created when the city's current vendor, The Pit Chic, on Grand Island, announced that she was getting out of the animal sheltering business.
In an interview in early March, Kelli Swagel, The Pit Chic owner and operator, told WIVB-TV that she was 'restructuring' her business and intended to move away from municipal animal sheltering contracts to focus more on dog boarding and training.
Swagel, who also operates a non-profit dog rescue organization, Rescue Buffalo, said a rise in animal cruelty, animal abandonment and strays have presented challenges for rescues and shelters that cater primarily to local dogs.
'There's a lot of dogs coming from out of state too and, as much as we know that we need to help those high-kill shelters, it's forcing shelters in New York state to have to make decisions for space and that's not something our shelter will ever align with,' Swagel said.
Swagel gave city officials 60 days notice that she was exiting her contract with the Falls.
The city is currently in the process of building a new animal shelter inside an existing building at Hyde Park.
Swagel had a controversial run as the Falls animal shelter provider, drawing often intense criticism from a former business partner, Janine Gallo, and some city residents and officials who questioned the quality of services she provided to the city and its stray dogs under a deal that paid her $20,270 per month.

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