Sheriff talks big plans for new county impound facility

Deputies of the Cache County Sheriff's Department assigned to animal control duties will soon have a new home in a proposed impound facility adjacent to the Cache County Jail.

CACHE COUNTY – Sheriff Chad Jensen has big plans in mind for a new animal impound facility adjacent to the Cache County Jail.

During Tuesday’s meeting of the Cache County Council, Jensen discussed the possibility of a valley-wide consolidation of all municipal and county animal control functions.

“Right now,” Jensen explained, “Cache County contracts with eight cities and towns to provide animal control services.

“As we do move this project forward, I like to see a representative from each of those communities become part of a working group to implement a countywide set of animal control ordinances.”

Those ordinances, the sheriff suggested, should address both uniform animal control laws and a standardized fee schedule for impounded animals.

“That way,” he added, “Lewiston’s ordinances wouldn’t be saying something different than those in Logan or Hyrum. To the guys with boots on the street, it’s hard to keep track of … ‘What city am I in?’ and ‘What are their particular laws about animal control issues?’.”

Jensen said that officials from some local communities have also inquired about Cache County implementing a countywide licensing program for dogs.

“That’s because some of our communities don’t have full-time staff members and their municipal licensing programs don’t pay for themselves,” the sheriff said.

Members of the Cache County Council unanimously gave a green light to plans to build the new animal impound facility on May 25.

The proposed facility will be approximately 11,000 square feet, including administrative offices, medical treatment facilities and kennels for impounded animals.

When completed, the new impound facility will be operated as a partnership between the Cache County Sheriff’s Office and the non-profit New Vision Veterinary service.

Under a recently finalized memorandum of understanding that was reviewed by the County Council members on Tuesday, Cache County will be responsible for administration of the impound facility, while New Vision staff and volunteers provide medical care and shelter services.

The new facility is intended to shelter all animals impounded by local city and county officials.

The New Vision Veterinary service operates in partnership with Utah State University, the Bridgerland Technical College and Cache County.

New Vision lists its available services as adoption, medical treatment, emergency care and hands-on instruction for veterinarians, technicians, students and interns.

Free News Delivery by Email

Would you like to have the day's news stories delivered right to your inbox every evening? Enter your email below to start!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

For security, use of Google's reCAPTCHA service is required which is subject to the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

I agree to these terms.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.