Guiding Eyes for Blind plans new veterinary hospital, guide dog kennel in Yorktown Heights
YORKTOWN HEIGHTS — Guiding Eyes for the Blind, headquartered in Yorktown Heights, is seeking an expansion to build a veterinary hospital and accommodate hundreds more guide dogs in training.
A development was recently proposed on 12 acres of land on Crompond Road, and would include a two-story, 30,000-square-foot veterinary hospital and kennel. It would house up to 220 dogs training to be guides.
Guiding Eyes for the Blind has called Yorktown Heights home for 69 years. The new facility would expand services the organization provides at its current Yorktown location, 611 Granite Springs Road, and at its Canine Development Center in Patterson, where puppies are bred.
Guiding Eyes has trained more than 10,000 guide dogs for people with vision loss and worked with thousands of volunteers who participated in raising, training and socializing potential guide dogs.
Yorktown Supervisor Tom Diana, who had raised a guide dog for Guiding Eyes for the Blind, applauded the organization's plans for expansion, saying he looks forward to continuing working with the “wonderful partner and good neighbor.”
The Crompond Road land had been owned by Temple Israel of Northern Westchester since 2005. It was a vacant property mainly used for congregational events. Guiding Eyes bought the property for $4 million in June.
“I’m very excited that they chose Yorktown to expand their facilities," Diana said. "They’re really great people to deal with. It would bring jobs and a dilapidated piece of property into a usefulness.”
How would new Guiding Eyes facility be used?
Like at Guiding Eyes' other locations, the new facility would be focused on guide dog training. The current 10-acre Yorktown location will continue to provide training programs while the Patterson facility focuses on breeding, birthing puppies and early puppy development.
Bill Ma, head of Technology and Operations at Guiding Eyes for the Blind, said the organization is working with architects to design a space that would reduce stress and promote optimal canine health and wellness.
“The town of Yorktown will continue to be known as the home of a renowned guide dog school with state-of-the-art facilities to achieve the mission of connecting exceptional dogs with individuals for greater independence,” Ma said.
The project is in the early planning stages. Construction may take about two years once site approval is secured.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Guiding Eyes for Blind plans veterinary hospital, kennel in Yorktown
