Hi Matthew and Jimmy!
It was a big day at CIMWI today… we moved back into the Hospital! I’ve attached a few photos (including a before picture) so you can see the big transformation. Thank you for making this project come true with your very generous product donation and great customer service along the way. Our pinniped rehabilitation hospital is lookin’ good, really good!
Tim Crews of Central California Surfacing was a great coach and help to Eric (our volunteer facilities guy that did the project in his spare time). We’re really proud and excited about the work Eric did! We appreciate you investing in our project and your interest in the work CIMWI does to rescue, rehabilitate and return sick, injured, displaced, orphaned, and oiled marine mammals back to the wild.
We finished the Hospital Resurfacing Project just in time too! This year CIMWI has experienced the highest number of marine mammal strandings in our history of operation, far surpassing when the Unusual Mortality Event (UME) was declared in 2013. CIMWI has rescued and treated 356 pinnipeds (sea lions and seals) year-to-date and the majority of these have been emaciated and sick sea lion pups. On May 10, 2015 CIMWI officially rescued 100% more pinnipeds YTD than our highest year since inception which was last year (2014) when our volunteer team rescued and treated 137 pinnipeds. CIMWI has been challenged in ways we’ve never been before and we were running 25-30% over capacity during most of the first five months of this year in effort to help care for more starving sea lions. 2016 is forecasted to be another extremely challenging year for marine mammals along the coast of California and CIMWI with the impact of El Niño conditions, the continuation of the Unusual Mortality Event, and being responsible for marine mammal rescue and rehabilitation in Santa Barbara County in addition to Ventura County. Thanks to Versatile Building Products, our patients will have the benefit of a Hospital with superior surfacing! You’ve added a great deal to our operation and we truly thank you.
Let me know if you’re going to be in the area, we’d love to show off what you helped us create!
All the very best,
Ruth Dover
Director of Business Operations
