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Companion Corner: Maisy and Prince at Berkshire Humane Society

By Breanna SteeleiBerkshires Staff
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PITTSFIELD, Mass. — There are a pair of cats who are looking for their new family to snuggle up to.

iBerkshire's Companion Corner is a weekly series spotlighting an animal in our local shelters that is ready to find a home. 

Prince and Maisy are a father and son duo at Berkshire Humane Society looking for a new home together.

Feline/small animal adoption counselor Alyssa Petell introduced us to them.

Prince is about 2 years old and dad Maisy is 5 and they have been at the shelter for a few months.

"Prince and Maisie have been here for about six months now. They came from a home with way too many animals, and eventually the people lost their homes, so they did have to be surrendered to our shelter," she said.

Maisy loves to receive pets and belly rubs. He likes to talk to you and will play as well.

"Maisy, here, as I said earlier, is so affectionate, he just wants to be pet all the time and loved, and he is a funny cat, because he has kind of a quirky side to where he wants to be pet like rough, he likes when you just mush his head and give him all the love," said Petell.

Maisy's son Prince, is also a talker and loves to play with toys. 

"Prince is a little more independent, but he's also very sweet. Prince is very vocal ... we do think that he's mostly deaf, so that's a part of him being very vocal," she said. "The second you walk in the room, he'll yell and get really excited, and just, you know, be really happy to see you. He'll always greet you, but he's very sweet, too. They're a very good pair of boys."

The two are healthy but Prince does have asthma. It doesn't change the way he plays, but he may be a little sneezy and have fits of coughs.

"Prince here actually does have what we call feline asthma. He was diagnosed with it. We did chest X-rays, blood work, trials of medications to kind of rule out everything, and he does have occasional bouts of sinusitis to where he gets really sneezy and boogery, so that is something that you know whoever adopts them would have to manage," she said.

The two can go to a home with children and with someone who would love very affectionate cats.

"I just think that they are the most wonderful pair of boys that deserve all the love in the world, and they're just amazing. I can't say anything else other than I wish the best for them. I think they're going to find a great home. If you're looking for an overly affectionate pair of boys, they are that pair of boys," she said.

Since June is "adopt a cat month," the Berkshire Humane Society is having a raffle — if you adopt a cat (or two) from the shelter, you will get to pick a mouse out of a prize bucket for a random prize, and you also get entered in a raffle to get a cat-themed gift basket. 

Both of their fees are sponsored.

You can visit Prince and Maisy at the Berkshire Humane Society and read more about them on the website.

The Berkshire Humane Society is open Tuesday through Sunday. The adoption center is open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday, and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday.

 

Tags: Berkshire Humane Society,   cats,   

If you would like to contribute information on this article, contact us at info@iberkshires.com.

State Housing Secretary Tours Downtown Pittsfield Developments

By Brittany PolitoiBerkshires Staff

PITTSFIELD, Mass. — The state's new secretary of the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities on Monday saw how local developers are transforming historic buildings into downtown housing units. 

Secretary Juana Matias, appointed to the role in February, toured the former St. Joseph's High School on Maplewood Avenue and the near-complete Wright Building Block on North Street.   

Matias observed local leaders working collaboratively to dismantle bottlenecks in housing production, something she said the administration wants to see across all 351 municipalities.  

"This is a perfect model of the partnerships we want to see, and we love coming to the ground and seeing how people are leveraging public taxpayer dollars to help address the issue of our time, which is housing production," she said after the tours. 

Developer David Carver, of Scarafoni Associates & CT Management Group, is seeking support from the state Housing Development Incentive Program to transform St. Joe's into apartments, and Allegrone Companies has secured millions from the program towards the Wright Building renovation

They first visited the shuttered school that functioned as a shelter during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, greeted by broken windows and leaving with Carver's vision. 

The plan is to transform the school with good bones into 19 apartments, 20 percent designated affordable, and 30 percent of the building for commercial use.  Units are expected to cost between $1,700 and $1,900 per month; 14 one-bedroom units and five two-bedroom units are planned. 

The project team is in talks with the nearby Berkshire Family YMCA to expand their childcare activities to the building's lower level.  Residents and the daycare would use different entrances. 

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