Group organizes to bring Bledsoe County first animal shelter

PIKEVILLE, Tenn. (WDEF)-In many of our population centers, animal shelters have reported being pushed to the brink being at or near capacity.

However, the situation is even worse in rural areas with no animal shelters at all.

Several of our rural counties do not currently have established animal shelters.

This includes our three Sequatchie Valley counties; Bledsoe, Marion, and Sequatchie.

In Bledsoe County however, some residents say it is time to begin a serious push to change that.

Skylar Lehman says she has run an animal rescue in Bledsoe County for years, and has rescued hundreds of animals.

However, she says the county is seeing a large issue with stray animals, compounded with no formal animal shelter.

The nearest ones are in Rhea and Cumberland Counties, who do not accept animals from outside of their counties.

Lehman said, ‘There are no options as far as animal shelters go… There are lots of abandoned, abused and neglected animals that don’t have anywhere to go simply because the rescues that are here pretty much exhausted their resources.”

She says the lack of a shelter leads to other issues.

Lehman said, “The leash law for the state is not being upheld. The rabies vaccination law for the state is not being upheld. So there are a lot of you know things that come with that people aren’t taking it into consideration other than you know, animals becoming a nuisance.”

That’s why she is heading up a citizens’ committee to discuss what it will take to bring a shelter to Bledsoe County.

She says three weekly meetings, the first one being Monday at the Lee Station Baptist Church, will be designed to discuss options and fundraising ideas.

Lehman said, “We have already got several fundraisers put in place to start raising money, and so once we established our board tonight, we’re going to continue with those efforts. We will try to find if not a building, at least some land that we can have the animals, and we’re just gonna start from zero and build it ourselves.”

She says that she has attempted to meet with Pikeville Mayor Phillip Cargle to discuss this animal shelter idea.

In Pikeville’s ordinances, it states the city is responsible for dealing with stray animals.

However, Lehman says that idea is facing resistance from the mayor.

Lehman said, “When I brought up the ordinance that stated that it was his responsibility to find someone with the animals to go, his response was that it just wasn’t really in their budget so in my opinion, he has not been responsive or willing to help at all.”

We have reached out to Pikeville Mayor Phillip Cargle for comment on this story, and if the town’s council plans to take part in these discussions.

So far, we have heard no comment.

Lehman is able to attend these weekly meetings, as she plans to livestream them on her Facebook page.

You can also reach out to her at Skylar.l.lehman@gmail.com