UPAWS opens their new shelter in Gwinn

GWINN — Earlier this week, UPAWS proudly opened their new campus to the public in Gwinn near the Marquette County Fairgrounds.

The staff has been hard at work moving all throughout this month, and now people are dropping by to see the improvements. Construction began back in 2017, and the organization had big plans.

The new facility features 22 spaces for dogs, nearly 40 spaces for cats, multiple holding and visitation rooms, and a large community events space.

“It’s a cleaner facility – it’s much more efficient,” said capital campaign manager, Kori Tossava. “In the old facility, we were always fighting old technology and different things like that. As people come in here, they’ll notice that the HVAC system helps our clinical quality stay where it needs to be, whereas before we had to have more of that hands-on cleaning.”

UPAWS is still fundraising to reach their goal to pay off the $3.7 million that was needed to open the adoption center. Tossava also said that, in time, a larger staff may be needed to run the shelter more efficiently.