Furor among rescue groups over operation of the Macon-Bibb County animal shelter may have died down, but a new forum to debate the shelter’s future is scheduled for next week.

At 7 p.m. Thursday, Bibb County is holding a meeting of “every animal interest group and all other interested citizens” at Macon City Hall, 700 Poplar St., to discuss design of the new shelter.

“We want to invite everybody who has an interest,” Commission Chairman Sam Hart said.

And fears among some animal rescue groups that Animal Control Director Jim Johnson planned a mass euthanization of 16 to 18 dogs this week are apparently unfounded. Five sick or injured dogs were put down, of which rescue groups knew about and approved, but that was all, Johnson said Friday.

“It’s calming down a little bit,” he said.

Several rescue group volunteers alleged that Johnson had made various changes that worsened the comfort and safety of animals in the shelter. Johnson said one minor change had been misinterpreted.

City officials said they got a steady stream of complaints and allegations from Monday until Thursday. Mayoral spokesman Chris Floore said Deputy Police Chief Mike Carswell is still reviewing those earlier statements.

Johnson was removed as shelter director last May and fired Aug. 29 after an internal city audit found $18,408 in shelter funds unaccounted for. His assistant, Paula Fuller, was also fired. Then on Jan. 19, administrative law judge Robert Herndon ruled that both should be reinstated after a 30-day suspension, which had already elapsed. He said they violated city procedures, but Johnson had an otherwise “unblemished record” for 20 years, and there was no evidence that Fuller actually stole money.

Fuller took a different job with the Georgia Department of Corrections, but Johnson returned to the shelter in the last full week of January.

Anne Brennaman, of rescue group Macon Purrs N Paws, said she had heard no more of the uproar since Thursday. In her subsequent visits to the shelter, workers there have been “quite pleasant,” she said.

“We’re just kind of hanging in, seeing where things go,” Brennaman said.

For now, that means focusing on plans for a new animal shelter. Janet Martin, staff veterinarian and developer of the new shelter medicine program at the University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine, is a consultant on the new shelter and will lead Thursday’s meeting, Hart said.

“Everybody that I know of is planning on going, everyone in the rescue community,” Brennaman said. Purrs N Paws, ARC Humane Society, Forever Friends and Central Georgia CARES all will send representatives, she said.

Bibb County will take over Animal Control employees and management of the 100-animal-capacity shelter at 1010 11th St. on July 1, in compliance with the service delivery deal the city and county signed last year.

The special purpose local option sales tax voters approved Nov. 8 includes $3 million for a new animal shelter. Backers said they were modeling their plan on an Alpharetta car dealership being extensively renovated as a 308-capacity shelter, at a cost about $10 million.

Hart said the county is open to building a new shelter or renovating an old one to meet modern specifications. The county wants to build a shelter that will serve well for years and won’t be full the moment it opens, he said. It should have features for some community education as well as housing animals, Hart said.

He said he knows there has been “some interest” from animal advocacy groups in shelter management, but the county hasn’t discussed it. Right now the county is concentrating on transferring shelter employees to county control. Nevertheless, county staff probably will be asked to examine any ideas about management change, Hart said.

“We’ve not made any commitment as it relates to that,” he said.

Brennaman quickly rejected the idea that local animal rescue groups might seek to actually manage the shelter, now or when a new one is built.

“That’s a governmental entity. Absolutely not -- we want to concentrate on rescue,” Brennaman said. “There’s a difference between animal control and animal rescue, and both have their place.”

Animal control’s job is to protect the public, while rescue groups focus on finding homes for healthy animals, she said. “We just want them to work with us,” Brennaman said.

To contact writer Jim Gaines, call 744-4489.