Pet Alliance Breaks Ground on New Orlando Shelter

The Pet Alliance of Greater Orlando with the help of a few shelter puppies break ground during "First Dig" ceremony for the new Animal Shelter.

The Orlando facility devastatingly caught fire back in 2021, killing more than a dozen animals. Now more than a year later, the organization is rebuilding and Pet Alliance is moving into a new chapter.

"Here we are, 19 months, 9 days later, breaking ground on our new facility," said Josh Powers, Pet Alliance's board chair. “We’ve gone from our darkest night to our new dawn, and we couldn’t be more excited about that.” City Commissioner Patty Sheehan, an avowed animal ally, was also on hand for the ceremony.

The $14 million, 25,000-square-foot facility will be one of the largest shelter medical facilities in the state of Florida, granting the Pet Alliance the space to house dogs and cats that might otherwise be euthanized. The shelter will feature AC for the animals, individual cat condos, walking trails for dogs, a medical space for ill or injured animals, disease specific quarantine space for dogs and cats, specialized housing for long-term dog residents, and more! The new shelter is scheduled to open in March 2025. "We are going to have one of the largest shelter-medical spaces in the state of Florida. And because of that, we'll be able to take in more medically-sensitive animals, provide more care," said Cathy Rodgers, Director of Development and Communication at Pet Alliance.

“We are very excited, we are at the final stages of our drawings, we are tweaking a few things, we are going to permit later in the summer,” said Steve Bardy, Executive Director of Pet Alliance of Greater Orlando.