Comment on this story Wednesday, May 12 •Spurred by the profligate spending of former University of Tennessee President John Shumaker, a bill forbidding school officials from using tuition receipts to purchase alcohol goes before Gov. Phil Bredesen. From now on, only students will be able to blow tuition money on booze. Thursday, May 13 •The News Sentinel reports that local Gary Lynn Harvey has been indicted on charges related to a scuffle with Knox County sheriff’s deputies that left him swollen and bruised in May of last year. Sources say Harvey violated a local ordinance by getting his ass kicked in a “no bleeding” zone. •The Sentinel also reports that Mormon members of the University of Nevada-Las Vegas football team will be able to play in their season-opening game with UT this fall, even though the contest was rescheduled for the Sabbath. We can’t help but wonder why playing a football game on Sunday would pose a moral dilemma to kids going to college in Vegas. Friday, May 14 •Reports say that overcrowded conditions at the Knox County jail finally seem to be improved, 18 years after a federal judge first told local officials to do something about the problem. In an apparently unrelated story, business is up 200 percent at the East Knox-area Motel 6. Saturday, May 15 •News from Jonesborough: Ku Klux Klan organizer Ricky Dean has called off a KKK rally after town leaders learn he may have underestimated the turn-out. Dean expected 20 Klansmen to attend, but local officials knew the only reason he couldn’t count to 21 was because he was too lazy to take off his pants. Sunday, May 16 •An AP wire story out of Nashville says that episodes of the old country music/redneck comedy television show Hee-Haw will be released on DVD. The show’s brand of humor—derived mostly from dumb hick characters who mispronounced words and told bad jokes—is particularly relevant today, having served as a template for so many White House press conferences. Knoxville Found What is this? Every week in “Knoxville Found,” we’ll print the photo of a local curiosity. If you’re the first person to correctly identify this oddity, you’ll win a special prize plucked from the desk of the editor (keep in mind that the editor hasn’t cleaned his desk in five years). E-mail your guesses, or send ’em to “Knoxville Found” c/o Metro Pulse, 505 Market St., Suite 300, Knoxville, TN 37902. Last Week’s Photo: Big Don the Costumier’s Old City shop serves as the canvas for the oddity featured in last week’s Knoxville Found. The Charlie Chaplin-esque caricature stares longingly across Central Avenue into the window at Pasta Trio, seemingly in hopes of snagging a morsel of discarded lasagna. Congratulations to Martha Wiley for identifying the silent film personality. We are pleased to present you with a leather-bound, promotional journal from the recent film The Alamo in exchange for your correct answer. Thanks for playing! Meet Your City A calendar of upcoming public meetings you should attend CITY COUNCIL WORKSHOP FOR BUDGET Thursday, May 20 9:30 a.m. City County Building Large Assembly Room 400 Main St. PUBLIC HEARING ON BUDGET Thursday, May 20 5 p.m. City County Building Large Assembly Room 400 Main St. COUNTY COMMISSION MEETING Monday, May 24 8:30 a.m. City County Building Large Assembly Room 400 Main St. CITY COUNCIL MEETING, SECOND READING OF BUDGET Tuesday, May 25 7 p.m. City County Building Large Assembly Room 400 Main St.

A Pet Project
City, county animal issues are now better centered

Every day, Kathy Darnell considers issues that the rest of us don’t want to think about. Homeless animals—puppies, kittens, cats and dogs, rabbits, ducks, bats, turkeys—show up on the doorstep of her workplace, the Knoxville-Knox County Animal Center, where they have a chance at finding a new place to live.

The brand new facility—officially named the Young-Williams Animal Center after major donors and board members Mark Williams and Lindsey Young—recently opened just off Sutherland Avenue. They’re still putting finishing touches on the building and moving animals from the nearby temporary space. Darnell, assistant director of the center, shows off the building’s nooks and crannies like a new home, her big blue eyes wide with excitement for the possibilities the center holds.

The center—shelter seems to be a term that’s being phased out for its negative connotations—became a necessity when the city and county’s relationship with the Humane Society of the Tennessee Valley ended (per the HSTV’s decision) on Dec. 31, 2000. The local governments had just a few months to plan for the housing of animals collected by animal control and brought in by citizens. The temporary space, built in 56 days, housed 200 animals in 8,000 square feet. After three-and-a-half years of construction, the new center can house more than 400 animals in 22,000 square feet. The city and county paid for the majority of the center with $1.5 million each, while $700,000 in private funds raised by the center’s board of directors paid for the adoption elements of the facility.

With its A-frame entryway and stone siding, the building resembles a mountain lodge. The sidewalk leading to the front door of the adoption center contains bricks purchased by local businesses and individuals to memorialize their beloved pets. “For little fellow, faithful companion, forever loved” reads one. Another reads, “In memory of Sophia, adopted 1972-1995. Best cat ever.” On one side of the reception desk is a community room for education and outreach purposes. On a Thursday afternoon, the room is full of students from Greenway Middle School. Taylor Slemmer, the center’s director of education and community outreach, introduces the group to an excitable puppy who was rescued by Animal Control from the back of a locked car.

To the left are rooms for adoptable animals to be viewed and visited by potential owners. Cats reside in a complex of plastic condos that can be converted into suites by removable divisions. When the facility is fully outfitted with animals, the cat colony rooms will be populated with roly-poly kittens entertaining themselves (and visitors) as they climb on play structures. The cats sleep, undisturbed by the dogs residing in their own section nearby. There isn’t the expected clamor of barking in the dog intake room; Darnell says the design of the kennels keeps the pups from looking at each other, which tends to set them off. The well-behaved bunch greets us with wagging tails and expectant eyes, only breaking into a barking chorus when Darnell grabs a box of Milkbones to treat a pair of gorgeous Golden Retrievers who were relinquished by their owner. “I have two Goldens,” Darnell says, as she coaxes them to take the snacks.

With the stir it has been causing in the media, the just-opened shelter is already drawing people with unwanted animals from surrounding counties that either don’t have shelters or adoption programs.

“We do euthanize here, but I think they see this as a more hopeful facility,” Darnell says. Although the new facility can house 400 or more animals, those slots will fill up quickly.

“Unfortunately, in summer, it won’t take long at all,” Darnell says. “This is a tougher time of year, a busier time.”

When the center is full, animals—either strays or owner relinquishments—turned in to the center are given three days before either being adopted or euthanized, five days if they have a collar or other signs of having an owner. But at peak capacity, animals turned over by their caretakers don’t have to be held for any time at all before they’re killed. That’s the painful reality of a shelter with not enough room for all the community’s unwanted animals. In past years, about 60 to 65 percent of animals taken in by the shelter have been euthanized. Darnell doesn’t see that percentage lowering in the near future, but she does hold out hope for progress. “Our roadmap to becoming a no-kill city involves” the spay/neuter education and adoption programs, she says.

HSTV is already a no-kill shelter. One year after canceling its contract with the city and county, HSTV stopped euthanizing healthy animals because of housing overflow. To combat the sheer number of animals coming through its doors, the Young-Williams center’s main mission is education—teaching people about the importance of spaying or neutering their pets. The spay/neuter program in Milwaukee has been so successful, says Darnell, that the city is experiencing a puppy shortage. The center has responded to this need by sending puppies north, which will help more of Knox County’s puppies find homes.

With its bright lights and clean, spacious enclosures, the Young-Williams Center is a place that potential pet owners will enjoy visiting. That’s the idea: the more comfortable humans are with the animal shelter, the more likely they are to adopt an animal.

“We really think this is going to change the image of sheltering. We have to present our animals in a nice setting,” Darnell says.

The adoption fee at the shelter and its two satellites at Pet Supplies Plus locations is $80, which includes spaying/neutering, shots (except rabies), heartworm test for dogs and a feline leukemia test for cats, and a microchip (for identification purposes). Each pet comes with a folder of information about its known history and bill of health, as well as a contract between the adopter and the center. Adopting an animal can be a smooth, if bureaucratic, process, but it’s also serious business. A pre-adoption consultation, as well as a final briefing, further assures that adopters know what they’re agreeing to, and solidify the center’s confidence in the animal’s continued well-being. “We want to make sure we’re getting as good a fit as we can,” Darnell says.

The center has begun a new program to test the temperament of dogs before they’re placed up for adoption. A checklist of traits allows the center to be confident in an animal’s behavior before the staff places the dog either with other dogs or up for adoption.

An intake facility for a metro area’s homeless animals combined with an adoption program is the most progressive means a local government can pursue to deal with its animal issues. Darnell says a shelter’s success is vastly improved by its physical connection to the community.

“In the past, shelters were stuck by the landfills or industrial sites at the edge of town,” she says, adding that the Young-Williams Animal Center’s site in the John Tarleton park is a boon to being visible and accessible to the community.

“We really want people to know that this is their facility,” Darnell says. “We want people to feel very welcome here.”

—Paige M. Travis

Kenny Siao, 1961-2004
His drowning’s a shock to many

Kenny Siao was Knoxville’s most imaginative and innovative restaurateur.

When he died Saturday at Hilton Head, S.C., he left a gap in Knoxville’s restaurant and social scene that will be hard to fill.

The ebullient 43-year-old, Malaysia-born, UT-educated entrepreneur had a string of successes that was the envy of many a would-be business proprietor. And he had an even longer string of friendships forged in and out of the restaurant industry.

An engineering graduate who found that profession “unfulfilling,” he turned to restaurant work, which had been his off-campus job as an undergraduate. Knoxville was fortunate that Siao adopted it as his home. In a little restaurant he bought from a friend in Gatlinburg, Siao began mapping a career that led him to open his first Asian-fusion spot, Stir Fry Café, in The Gallery shopping center on Kingston Pike in 1993.

He took the concept farther upscale at Mango in 1997; then he ventured into the new country/low country market at the Bleu Hound in Oak Ridge in 1999; and a year later opened Cha Cha, a tapas bar specializing in Spanish-influenced tidbits that became a gathering spot for Homberg Place swells. He recently opened another Stir Fry in Johnson City. All of his restaurants were thriving at the time of his death. He was also part-owner of a West Knoxville mortgage-processing firm, U.S. Title Co.

Authorities in Hilton Head, where he was weekending, said the cause of death was accidental drowning. He was pulled from the surf by lifeguards, who tried to resuscitate him, and was pronounced dead at Hilton Head Regional Medical Center.

Beach Service officials there were quoted as saying the weather conditions were normal and that there were no apparent unusual sea conditions when Siao drowned. An avid boater, as well as motorcyclist, Siao swam, but was not an especially strong swimmer, friends say.

His favorite music was the blues, and now he’s left a whole community with a case of it.

—Barry Henderson

May 20, 2004 • Vol. 14, No. 21 © 2004 Metro Pulse