Chula Vista’s animals hurt by economic woes

This is a tough time to be an animal in this suburb of San Diego -- particularly if you’re an animal employed by, sheltered by or exhibited by the cash-poor city government.

As the city struggles with its share of the national financial mess, programs involving animals are being hard hit.

The City Council last week tentatively approved eliminating the Police Department’s K-9 unit and dis- persing its five Belgian Malinois.

The city’s Animal Shelter, its budget cut by 20% a year ago, has a bumper crop of animals, some abandoned by owners who lost their homes to foreclosure, some the result of an unexplained cat population boom.

A facility that can “comfortably” house 300 animals now has a daily census between 500 and 560. More animals are having to be euthanized.

“The staff have been working their tails off to find homes,” said Leah Browder, deputy city manager.

But the most high-profile animals imperiled by the city’s budget problems are those at the Chula Vista Nature Center -- including a bald eagle, dozens of species of fish, reptiles, raptors and other smallish vertebrates, and a sweet-tempered iguana named Verdi.

The center, set on 3.3 acres amid the federally run 316-acre Sweetwater Marsh National Wildlife Refuge, has attracted school classes and families for two decades. It specializes in animals native to the region. Verdi, a onetime pet who outgrew his cage, is an exception.

Last year 65,000 people visited the center, including 15,000 students. The Chula Vista school district stat- ions a science teacher in a fully outfitted classroom at the center.

But in December, the center was put on notice: The city (population 230,000) can no longer afford its $1-million-a-year budget.

A city that once had 1,250 full-time employees now has 1,050 full-time employees. To avoid more layoffs, employee groups have agreed to give up raises. All employees except police and firefighters have been ordered to take a five-day unpaid furlough.

News that the center’s days were numbered brought a civic outcry and a desperate fundraising appeal.

“We’re scrambling,” said Buck Martin, the city’s director of recreation who assumed responsibility for the Nature Center a year ago when the on-site director was laid off.

Since Dec. 4, center boosters have collected about $530,000, including $125,000 from an anonymous donor and $125,000 from Sempra Energy, parent of San Diego Gas & Electric Co.

Last week the council gave the center a budgetary reprieve until July 1 but with no promises after that. In exchange, the council wants to see a plan by March 31 for the center to get off the public dole.

A campaign is apace to tap corporate, individual and foundation donors. Webcams are being added so the public can watch the bald eagle and clapper rails on the center’s website, www.ChulaVista NatureCenter.org.

It’s not easy for an animal attraction to get noticed in a region that includes SeaWorld, the San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal Park, the Stephen and Mary Birch Aquarium in La Jolla and the Natural History Museum in Balboa Park.

Visitors coming south on Interstate 5 are greeted with billboards for the zoo and Sea World. Yet the same visitors can drive past the Chula Vista Nature Center -- half a mile west of I-5 -- and scarcely notice.

“The center is a jewel that a lot of people don’t know about,” Martin said.

Some of that obscurity has been rectified by the threat of closure. Attendance has doubled. The Stephen and Mary Birch Foundation last week donated $100,000 to the rescue effort.

The center’s marketing strategy has always been to keep its prices -- $6 for adults, $4 for teenagers -- well below those of the area’s better known attractions. For $65 a year, a family of two adults and five children can have unlimited visits.

“Our plan has always been to keep the cost about the same as a movie,” said Charles Gailband, curator of animals. The park is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day except Monday.

The center’s eight employees and dozens of volunteers do not like to think about it, but the future for animals could be terminal.

Some, such as the bald eagle or Verdi, will be easy to place in new homes. Other animals probably will not be. Most could not live in the wild. Many would require new owners to get special permits from the federal government.

If the center is closed, some of the animals will have to be destroyed, officials said.

“It’s grim, but that’s our reality,” Gailband said.

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tony.perry@latimes.com