Humane Animal Treatment Society (HATS) Executive Director Jill Irving hopes area residents cast enough votes in an online contest to give the Isabella County Animal Shelter a grant.

As executive director of HATS, the organization that runs the animal shelter, Irving wants what is best for the stray animals that are housed at the shelter, located at 1105 S. Isabella Road in Union Township.

Since HATS began running the shelter in 2008, the group has offered spay and neuter clinics, has purchase feline habitats and urges volunteers to visit with animals and walk dogs near the shelter grounds. “We work in conjunction with Isabella County. We work diligently to get [animals] tested immediately to make sure they’re healthy, and if they’re not, we take steps to get them to that point.”

“It will be used specifically for spay and neutering services. We are in the middle of kitten season, and we pushing to convince everybody about the importance of spaying and neutering,” Irving says about the grant, “We started the pitch at the beginning of [last] week, and we were ranked 1,710, and now we’re at 980, that was Wednesday.”