Main Street businesses in Warrenton donated $1,750 for veterinary services at Warrenton Animal Shelter, raffling a gift basket and flat screen TV to raise funds.

Routine care for pets might seem mundane for many animal owners. But before those pets make it to good homes, the shelters that take them in have to carefully budget for veterinary services, including sometimes making some hard choices.

At the Warrenton Animal Shelter, dogs or cats brought in with severe injuries, such as a broken bone, can create a financial challenge for care, said animal control supervisor Brenda Klingler.

“Those are the kind of things that are out of our normal scope (of operations),” Klingler said. “That can use up your whole vet budget on one animal. If we want to be able to do those kinds of things, we have to have assistance.”

Assistance is exactly what the shelter got last week with the donation, which was organized by April Vahey, owner of Bunny’s Craft Corner. The funding will pay for routine spay and neuter services, freeing other funding for any emergency care the animals need.

“We love the fact that the community is getting behind what we’re trying to do. We want the shelter and the care of animals in our community to be a community-wide thing,” Klingler said. “We need everybody involved. ... Fundraising is very difficult with COVID right now. Most of the sources we have for doing that went away.”

Having funding outside their normal budget allows the shelter to care for more animals and provide additional services, Klingler said. Luckily, she said it isn’t hard to find people willing to help.

“‘Animal people’ are the most generous people there are,” Klingler commented.

Vahey, the fundraiser organizer, couldn’t agree more. She sold over 300 raffle tickets, raising more than $1,500 at her shop alone. She said customers only had moderate interest in the raffle, until they were told it all went to the animal shelter.

“I’m a dog person. Can you tell?” asked Vahey, tugging on her paw-print shirt. When she did a yard sale over the summer, Vahey traded face masks for shelter donations.

Vahey brought previous experience as the president of local playground association in Pennsylvania to the fundraising effort.

Businesses participating in the fundraiser were Bunny’s Craft Corner, Blue Anchor Bistro, Maw Maw’s Cupboard, Luminesce salon and Lindsay J photography, which all donated items and gift certificates and sold raffle tickets. A 55-inch Vizio flat screen TV was donated by Renee Sutton.

The raffle winner, drawn on Dec. 22, was Jordin King, who got to bring home the unexpected Christmas gifts the same day.