From the SPA
By Alfredo S. Lanier

With a lot of help from our friends

The Sociedad Protectora de Animales is a major San Miguel charity with fixed expenses and responsibilities, a complex and expensive operation with a payroll of eight, a subsidized clinic offering services for low-income pet owners and food and shelter costs for 90 animals waiting to be adopted.

This brand of comprehensive service saved Chester, a gray kitten found by Bruno Ramos, our new shelter manager, about a block away from the SPA. We figure Chester is about three weeks old; he is 10 inches nose-to-tail and weighs a few ounces.

For such a diminutive creature, Chester also has a disproportionately loud meow, no doubt a mixture of hunger and fear. Bruno says it was the meowing that caught his attention.

To cope with limited capacity and a stream of abandoned or surrendered animals, the SPA is forced to keep an admissions waiting list. Chester was able to bypass the list. He was so small and helpless, and did we mention loud? Indeed, the minute someone named him “Chester,” he effectively became another animal under the care of the SPA.

To help such creatures and provide other services, the SPA relies on a long and vital chain of generous donors and volunteers. We’re fortunate to have several major donors who give from their hearts, not their heads. Our deepest thanks and appreciation go to them for their continuing generosity.

A most impressive contribution last year came from Doc and Emily Severinsen. His benefit performance, along with Gil and Cartas, helped raise thousands of dollars for the SPA and two other humane groups. An encore is in the works.

Among philanthropies, the San Miguel Community Foundation deserves special mention for its annual grants to the SPA. These major contributions help the organization pay for day-to-day expenses and also major capital projects. A US$5,000 grant last year from SMCF helped with the construction—taking place right now—of a masonry wall around the lot adjacent to the SPA’s main facility, to create a playground for our dogs while they await adoption.

Jim and Kelly Karger get a special citation for carrying many of our mutts—a breed sometimes known as San Miguel Specials—to the US for adoption.

SPA members also help us with their dues. Memberships increased immediately before our members’ meeting earlier this month. We welcome and thank these new members.

Two service providers also deserve recognition. Maritere Dobarganes has helped us cope with documents that needed translation from English into Spanish or vice versa.

Architect Olga Adriana Hernández, a bona fide animal softie, has also assisted us with various projects. She is now helping us design, and we hope build, new quarters for our cats.

Other volunteers are too numerous to thank, but we’ll try to mention a few without sounding like the winners droning on Oscar night.

Kathi Hamblet has been working with our dogs and training them for years. Joan Dipiero and Lou Peca, working in shifts, provide daily nurturing and human contact to cats in order to socialize them and facilitate their adoption. Marie Abercrombie also comes at least once a week to help socialize our sometimes timid or rambunctious dogs.


Other volunteers, such as Rosalie Gower, often foster animals too young to stay by themselves at the SPA. Interested? Keep in mind that a tiny kitten or puppy often requires feedings every two or three hours, round-the-clock.

The list certainly must include Lola Cortina, a veteran “foster mom” now taking care of Chester. He seems fine, much quieter than when he first arrived at the SPA, though he is being treated for possible dehydration.

If you want to volunteer, come to the SPA at Los Pinos 7, near the central bus station. If you want to make a donation, we have a mailbox at La Conexión mailing service at Aldama 3 or you may visit www.spasanmiguel.org.

And if you already volunteer or contribute, a heartfelt thanks goes to you from everyone at the SPA—and certainly from Chester. 

Alfredo S. Lanier is the Acting Director of the SPA.