By Steven Barker
News Editor
After almost 40 years of treating and rehabilitating injured and rescued birds, California State University, Bakersfield’s Facility for Animal Care and Treatment is closing.
In an email provided to The Runner, David Germano, director of FACT, said the facility will no longer accept injured animals in preparation for its June 2015 closure.
According to Anne Houtman, dean of the School of Natural Sciences, Mathematics and Engineering, FACT’s closure is the result of three factors:
- The university was unable to secure enough outside funding to maintain the facility
- NSME’s doubling of size over last 10 years and the increased popularity of biology as a major necessitated a greater need of financial resources
- FACT’s mission of providing avian care did not fully align with the university’s core educational mission.
“This was nobody’s fault,” Houtman said. “Anywhere you go avian rescue is an extremely expensive project that has been extremely underfunded. The staff and director really made valiant efforts to keep FACT operating, but avian care is not a high priority area for funding.”
Germano, who is also a biology professor at CSUB, added that increasing workloads in the biology department have made the personal costs of maintaining the facility untenable.
To accommodate the biology department’s need for funding, Houtman said that FACT’s budget will be reinvested in providing biology students with more class and laboratory sections. While Houtman, Germano and FACT coordinator Marlene Hensley-Benton declined comment regarding FACT’s budget, a California Public Records Act request is being processed to determine the size of FACT’s budget and its subsequent reinvestment.
Germano assured that new shelters would be found for the birds currently being rehabilitated by FACT in advance of the site’s closure.
“We will find new homes for all the unreleasable birds that we […] have. There are a number of bird rescue facilities in Kern County and neighboring counties that we will be working with on this,” Germano said.
Three such centers – the Califonia Living Museum, Tehachapi Wildlife Rehab and Education and Critter Creek Wildlife Station – were specifically named. The latter is located in Fresno County.
Hensley-Benton said that FACT receives more than 200 animals annually. She added that upwards of 20 birds are currently being treated by the facility.
For Casi Cortez, a 22-year-old CSUB alumna, FACT’s imminent closure is saddening. Cortez, who served as a volunteer with the facility for six months prior to receiving a yearlong internship with Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation in Kendalia, Texas, says her training with FACT was helpful in securing her internship.
“It allowed me to work where I’m working now,” Cortez said. “That training gave me the tools to figure out what the process is when working with wildlife.”
Cortez added that touring FACT as a child was instrumental in her decision to pursue wildlife care as her career.
“I remember going to FACT in elementary school on one of the tours they provide,” Cortez said. “I remember being in awe at all the birds and the presentation on ecosystems and the cycle of life and the impact of people on everything and the ability to coexist.
“From that time to the time I got to work there, everything came together and made me understand this is what I wanted to do. FACT gave me that spark in terms of wanting to work with animals.”
With FACT’s closure, Hensley-Benton said 10 volunteers and 10 students would lose the ability to work with the birds.
To create additional opportunities for CSUB to engage with the local community, Houtman said the university is considering planting either a botanic or community garden. However, due to uncertainty regarding the availability of funding, Houtman added that neither idea has officially been approved.
Founded in 1972 and opening in 1975, FACT was originally established and run by then-professor of biology Ted Murphy. This year marks its 39th consecutive year in which it has tended to injured birds native to Kern County.