By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

Medicine River Wildlife Centre denied grant money for completion of hospital

Apr 25, 2018 | 5:32 PM

The Medicine River Wildlife Centre received some tough news this week.

The animal rehabilitation facility was informed they will not receiving any money from this year’s Community Facility Enhancement Program (CFEP) grant.

Executive Director Carol Kelly says they applied for more than $400,000 to put a roof on the centre’s new hospital. Concrete walls for the building went up in February.

Medicine River Wildlife Centre has been closed to the public for more than four years due to the building, “literally falling apart,” Kelly says.

“I don’t think I can express how disappointed I am. Then again, I never get my hopes up too high because I know we are one of many looking for money.”

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Kelly says grant administrators she spoke with told her their application had no deficiencies. She was also told that of the 70 applications, less than half got any money and just one applicant receiving it’s full amount requested.

So where does the Medicine River Wildlife Centre — which sees more than 2200 patients annually — go from here?

Kelly says she’s been encouraged to apply for the grant again in October, but that would mean another entire year of waiting to find out if they’ll be approved.

“The simplest way I can think of is there are hundreds and hundreds of people out there who’ve asked us for support, hundreds who’ve said they can’t wait until we’re open, and more than 4000 who follow us on Facebook,” she says. “If each one of those people could raise or send $100, we would have the total amount of money.”

Kelly says they’ll move forward with the roof, as well as the inside of the building as the money rolls in.

“We need to get this thing up and running.”

Meanwhile, the Medicine River Wildlife Centre has launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise $160,000 for a new raptor compound.

Four years ago, the original eagle/hawk flight area was seriously damaged by heavy snow and two eagles died when the roof eventually collapsed.

The centre says it has struggled to find ample space for its recovering birds of prey to spread their wings.

In addition, the owl cages are beginning to show their age.

The centre is hoping to raise these funds to build a larger and more durable structure.

The Medicine River Wildlife Centre is located approximately 45 km west of Innisfail.