NATCHEZ — A long-awaited new animal shelter will roll into Natchez Monday and make its way to the Natchez-Adams County Humane Society site being prepared for it now on Liberty Road.

The metal building, being manufactured by Morton Buildings in Garden City, Ala., is expected to arrive in Natchez at approximately 2:30 p.m. that day.

It will be greeted by a host of jubilant humane society staffers, volunteers and Natchez community members, said Sue Stedman, vice president of the Natchez-Adams County Humane Society, at that group’s annual meeting at Rolling Rivers Roasters on Main Street Monday evening.

“It just doesn’t get any better than that for me,” Stedman said.

She said the community is invited to watch the building being unloaded at the site.

Foundation and plumbing work for the new building is under way now at the new shelter site. The building is expected to be ready for the shelter to occupy in March or April 2015, Stedman said.

David Paradise, Humane Society treasurer, said the first round of bids for the shelter project were rejected because they came in at about $1.7 million, much more than Humane Society board members expected.

“We redrew the plans and cut a lot of things out and sent them out for a second round of bids,” Paradise said.

The cost of the new shelter is expected to be $1.38 million, he said.

“We have available right now $850,000, which means we are about $500,000 short,” Paradise said. “We’re going to have a heck of a lot of fundraising going on.”

Of the $850,000 available now for the shelter, $350,000 was received recently in the form of a donation from the Brenda Voght Harrison estate, which is the largest single gift in Natchez-Adams County Humane Society history, said Kathy Fitch, president.

“Her brother, McVay Voght, is a Church Hill resident and a huge animal lover and wanted to make a donation to a cause that would help animals,” Fitch said. “We just found out about this gift about two weeks ago.”

The new facility will make life easier for animals and staffers alike at the Natchez-Adams County Humane Society, which is located now in a building that one Humane Society Volunteer Robert Greene called “toxic” and “shamefully neglected.”

Despite the shortfall in the facility last year, Humane Society staffers and volunteers successfully placed nearly 80 percent of the dogs that entered the facility into homes or sent them to no-kill shelters through its transport program.

“Transport has been a very good investment for us because puppies we can’t find homes for here go to areas of the country where they can be placed in a home, which in turns opens up a space for another dog here,” Fitch said.

“About 800 healthy, adoptable, lovable puppies that we just couldn’t find homes for here were transported to other areas that don’t have an abundance of dogs and they all found homes,” she said.

The Humane Society here currently transports puppies three times per month to no-kill shelters in Tampa, Fla., Chicago and to shelters in Massachusetts.

Those areas, because of strict licensing and permitting of pets, do not have the stray and feral animal population found here and elsewhere.

Unfortunately, the same is not true for the cat population, Fitch said.

However, a group of cat-loving shelter volunteers held more than 100 adoption days for Natchez Adams County Humane Society cats and kittens this fiscal year, Fitch said.

Also at its meeting Monday night:

• Laurie Morgan, assistant to the treasurer and bookkeeper, announced the Humane Society spent $365,221.93, which was $77,921.93 more that it was budgeted to spend. However, the Humane Society took in $386,435.78 in revenues, $98,435.78 than was budgeted.

“The shelter spent more, but raised more than it spent,” Morgan said.

• The Natchez Adams County Humane Society members elected a slate of four board members — Paul Hargrave, Laurie Morgan, Sue Stedman and Deanne Tanksley — to serve three-year terms. Those candidates survived a challenge that included nominations from members at large of Robert Greene, Tommie Lynn Coyle and Linda Kennon.

Members of the Natchez firm Silas Simmons counted ballots.

• The Humane Society presented Life Saver awards to Mae and Friends Lemonade Stand, which has raised more than $32,000 for the Natchez Adams County Humane Society in its six years of operation; and Paws for a Cause Thrift Store volunteers Susan Callon, Vicki Jordan, Jana Ross, Patti Blackwood and Lillie de Shields.

The thrift store now operates two locations and is in need of donations of leftover items from garage sales or spring cleaning and tables and shelves on which to display donated items.