Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, August 21, 1993 TAG: 9312010327
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Short
The nonprofit center at Weyers Cave has become one of the nation's leading veterinary facilities for wildlife. It has saved thousands of injured animals - many of them endangered species - since it was opened in 1982 by environmentalist Ed Clark.
But, as Clark says, it's been a "nickel-and-dime operation" - a makeshift center of trailers and animal cases and pens.
That will soon change. The center hopes to break ground next month for a new home in the Waynesboro area.
The project was launched a couple of years ago with a gift of land by E. I. Du Pont de Nemours & Co., which has a fibers plant in Waynesboro. Since, it's been helped along by nearly $650,000 in donations of cash and in-kind contributions.
By next summer, the center expects to move into a new state-of-the-art veterinary hospital-and-teaching facility. This, by all rights, should complement the teaching and services provided by the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine, based at Virginia Tech.
It also fits in nicely with Roanoke's Explore Park and other projects, developing or proposed in this region, that stress environmental and conservation themes.
The new wildlife center will be welcomed by Western Virginia residents, human and otherwise.
by CNB