The Cal Poly Cat Program is tentatively set to move to the Avila Ranch House by the end of April. Their current location, where they have been located for over 30 years, is being taken over to expand the Cal Poly Technology Park, according to Cat Program Faculty Advisor Damon Watkins.
The program is a sanctuary for cats to help control the feral cat population in San Luis Obispo, and originally started as a Trap Neuter Release (TNR) program in 1992, but evolved into a shelter according to Cal Poly Cat Program president Natalie Siler.
“We’ve been increasing what we do. Currently, we have about 65 cats in our program,” Siler said. “Anything we can do to help the local community with cats.”
According to Watkins, the new space will greatly benefit the cats, staff and students. The new location is behind a coded gate, making it safer for students to volunteer in the evening.
“It’s a way better space for the cats in general. It’s also spectacularly beautiful up there,” Watkins said. “The combination of a better space for the animals, more secure for our students and community members and then just the opportunity to have more space to actually utilize for the program as a whole.”
The goal for the Cat Program is to transition into a sanctuary.
“It won’t just be a shelter, we’re trying to create a sanctuary,” Watkins said. “So it’s a place where students can come and hang out if they just want to hang with the cats, study…We really want to make this a community space for people.”
The new location, previously a residential space, will offer a larger layout including a kitchen and bathroom connected to the shelter and an outdoor area three times larger than their current space.
“Having more of a house-style setup with the kitchen and a bathroom will be a lot more helpful for us with bathing cats and doing different types of medications because we’ll have a whole extra space that’s separate from our main shelter area,” recreation parks and tourism senior treasurer and fundraising coordinator Mimi Raytis said.
Currently, the biggest challenge the Cat Program is facing is waiting for the space to be ready for move-in. Their initial move was set for Jan. 1, which has now been set back to the end of April due to renovations and past structural damage.
Watkins’ primary role in assisting the move is maintaining the lines of communication between different entities on campus to ensure that there is funding being put toward assisting the move. Due to the program being volunteer-based, all money donated goes directly to the cats.
“As the pledge comes in dedicated to the cats, I cannot take that money and spend it on anything else but the cats and so right it’s working with campus and facilities to get them to understand that we need this all done so that we can move in and we’re not paying for it,” Watkins said.
At their current location, the Cat Program has been cleaning up the old shelter. Volunteer Coordinator Meili Laiho worked with volunteer groups to make sure the program was prepared for the move.
“We have done a bunch of different tasks like inventory, just to see what we have that we’re going to need to buy,” she said. “Then we’ve been doing a lot of cleaning so kind of just deep cleaning up the old shelter and then deep cleaning the new shelter.”
According to Laiho, the Cat Program facilities managers have been focusing on cleaning up the new shelter by landscaping and cleaning out the overall building by getting rid of old items.
Laiho is most excited about the additional space once moved into the new location.
“I know at the current shelter there are definitely some tight spaces,” she said. “I would ideally be able to kind of expand those spaces a little bit just so we can more effectively work there.”