“I am still hopeful funds can be identified for this important project,” Tudela said.
The project needs $150,000.
He is now pushing the original plan, which is to build the animal shelter in Kagman, after the proposed As Perdido site was aborted.
“There has been a lot of finger-pointing and election season talk demanding action,” Tudela said. “I have received a lot of criticism, yet I understand their frustration. But we have had a very difficult time because we were forced to relocate the site several times and funding still needs to be provided.”
He said his office is working with the Department of Public Works and its technical services division to draw up a new plan.
Late last year, he said a design for the new facility was completed with an adjoining office, a storage room and other necessities.
When he took office in 2002, he said he wanted to construct the animal shelter in Kagman near the agricultural station but the area was then occupied by a construction company.
The alternative site was the former piggery at the As Perdido agricultural station and a design was immediately completed.
“But the lack of approval by the [now defunct] Marianas Public Lands Authority for more than two years continued to frustrate our efforts,” Tudela said.
But he said his office continued its efforts to do what it could to prepare for the project.
A team of his staff members were sent to the animal shelter on Guam for training in dog handling.
Rules, regulations and the requirement for proper licensing and sale of dog tags were finalized and sent to the Attorney General’s Office for review and publication in the Commonwealth Register, he added.
When a law was enacted abolishing MPLA in 2006, he said they expected the renovation of the former piggery in As Perdido to finally move forward.
However, Tudela said, the governor’s office announced that the agricultural station would be reserved for the construction of a new public school.
“This meant that the urgently needed animal shelter was again without a home,” he said.
Saipan’s stray dog control law was enacted in 1995, but no funding was identified for it.
