Drop in donations worries operators of Hampton Bays wildlife rescue center

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A pair of great horned owls at the Wildlife Rescue Center of the Hamptons.
Photos by Will James

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For the first time in its nearly 10-year history, the Wildlife Rescue Center of the Hamptons in Hampton Bays is expected to end the year with a deficit, and the shortage could force the organization to make concessions in its treatment and rehabilitation of wild animals.

The nonprofit, which takes in injured wildlife found on both the North and South forks, relies heavily on donations, and private contributions have slowed in the last year. In 2008, donations accounted for about 56 percent, or $262,000, of the $468,000 taken in by the center, while the rest of the facility’s funding came from grants and other sources.

Suzanne Ruggles, a Westhampton business owner who serves on the center’s board of directors, attributed this year’s falloff in donations, which is expected to be in the neighborhood of $50,000 when the books on 2009 are officially closed, to the national recession.

“Our fund-raisers haven’t been as well attended this year as they’ve been in years past,” she said.

Ms. Ruggles explained that a golf outing scheduled for September 29 at the Hampton Hills Golf and Country Club in Westhampton was cancelled because only four people signed up. Last year’s golf outing netted about $14,000 for the wildlife center, she said.

Virginia Frati, the executive director of the Wildlife Rescue Center, said the facility had always operated at a surplus until this year.

“We were very upset about having a deficit because that’s never happened,” she said, adding that the center is not in danger of closing.

The rescue center was expected to raise about $448,000 in donations and grants in 2009, but has received only $295,000 as of the end of October, according to a financial report from the center. Ms. Frati said she is still waiting on revenues from the center’s “Get Wild” fund-raiser that was held this past summer at a private home in Southampton. That event should net another $5,000, she said.

After adding donations from the fall and winter, Ms. Frati said the center should come in about $50,000 in the red. Typically, the center is in the black at this point in the year, she said.

The good news is that the center is not beholden to anyone in terms of debt, mortgages or loans, according to Ms. Frati, and since it finished with an approximately $72,000 surplus last year, it is in good shape to weather this year’s decrease in donations.

“So, in that respect, we’re good,” Ms. Frati said. “But when that runs out, it’s going to be a little scary.”

If the center continues to come up short after its reserve runs out, which Ms. Frati said she expects to be sometime next year, it will have to start paring down services. She said she might have to downsize her staff, which includes five full-time employees and another few part-timers during the summer, some of whom are trained to administer first aid drugs, apply splints, clean wounds and euthanize animals that cannot be rehabilitated.

Ms. Frati said the center might also have to start cutting certain programs and even begin euthanizing more animals—in particular, those with the worst prognoses. As of right now, the center has the money to spend on expensive treatments, though that could change if donations do not pick up in 2010.

The Wildlife Rescue Center of the Hamptons opened its doors in 2000 in Munn’s Pond County Park on Montauk Highway. Since then, workers and volunteers have been responding to calls from police and residents about deer caught in fences, injured birds, turtles clipped by lawnmowers and other similar cases. The center administers first aid, tends to the animals while they recover and rehabilitates them in an outdoor area before releasing them back into the wild.

Some of the rehabilitated animals, like a red-tailed hawk named Beauty that has an injured talon, end up becoming permanent residents of the center and are used in educational demonstrations. The center admitted 1,289 animals and performed more than 2,000 field rescues in 2008, according to an annual report by the center.

Though it has been a rough year in terms of finances, the center has not seen a drop-off in requests and services. Ms. Frati said admissions are up about 10 percent in 2009 when compared to last year’s statistics.

She also stressed that, in spite of the financial issues, the center is not in danger of closing.

“There are ways we can still cut,” Ms. Frati said, “but we’ll never close the doors.”