Staff and volunteers at the Parksville Qualicum Beach & District Branch of the BC SPCA spent Friday cleaning up after vandals broke in and damaged the facility.
Branch manager Nadine Durante said RCMP called her early Friday morning about the break-in.
When she arrived at the facility, she discovered that the vandals had done enough damage — including tearing the hydro metre off the building — to leave the branch without power, water or phone connections.
The vandals also smashed glass, trashed the building’s interior, rifled through medicine cabinets and made off with at least one laptop filled with work files, she said.
“Someone smashed into the side door of our branch and did a lot of vandalism inside,” said Durante.
“It’s pretty distressing to find out that someone would come into a not-for-profit organization where there’s animals that already are at a stress level that’s not exactly comfortable, and then increase that stress level.”
RCMP officers spent the day collecting evidence and fingerprints from the SPCA, and investigators canvassed the neighbourhood for video evidence.
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Lynn Haslam, who was intending to adopt a dog from the Parksville branch, arrived to find it closed on Friday.
She said the fact that someone would break into a volunteer-run non-profit was disappointing.
“For somebody to target a place like that, I don’t know, you can’t imagine what’s going on in some people’s minds I guess,” she said.
“Why they think this would be some place reasonable to come help themselves to whatever it was, or just do damage for damage’s sake. It’s very upsetting.”
The branch posted an update to its Facebook page later on Friday to say that the power was back on, that the animals were safe, happy and warm, and that the organization was catching up on correspondence and vet appointments.
Durante said if there is a silver lining, it has been the outpouring of support for the organization.
“I’ve been completely amazed, it’s been very heartwarming to know that people care in our community and beyond,” she said.
“I’ve had some colleagues contact me, some volunteers and just people who really care who’ve seen it on social media.”