RESCUING DOGS & CATS from georgia kill shelters--approved by leon

[clydepepper]

Originally Posted by forazzurri2axz

RESCUING DOGS AND CATS FROM GEORGIA KILL SHELTERS-APPROVED BY LEON

Hello and happy holidays to all Net54's and a big " thank you" to Leon who is allowing me to post this

Being retired for the past 2 years has given me lots of time to think what to do in the coming years. An animal lover with 2 dogs and 2 cats, I have come to realize that my calling is to save as many as I can from the kill shelters here in Atlanta . There are 100,000 euthanized each year in Atlanta and if I can save and find homes for some of these, it will make a difference in the lives of many families and of course , to the animals I save.

My goal is to acquire land in an outlying county, provide necessary shelter for the rescued animals, and find homes not just in the Atlanta area but in the non-kill states where people often adopt from the southern kill states. Never having done anything like this before, and feeling overwhelmed by the task ahead, I have contacted a similar organization in North Georgia and they have graciously offered to meet with me after the New Year and answer my 3 million questions as our interests and goals are similar.

While I realize that donations down the road will be necessary to continue, there are a few things I can think of that I need to do NOW in order to begin this venture. Anyone who is able to volunteer or know someone who can for the following is greatly appreciated.

1) Formation of a Ga. non profit 501c3 corporation

2) Website creation---

3) Business Plan--While I have many ideas and will be learning a lot more from my meeting next week, I have neither the experience ( nor the smarts!) in putting this in a presentable format. I imagine I would need a business plan to present down the road to potential big donors or to already existing organizations with whom one can work in getting the animals adopted.

If anyone is able to help, please contact me at forazzurri1@aol.com or my cell is 770-873-1181

Bill Latzko
Homeward Bound Adoption Center (probable name!!)

Bill- I admire and share your passion for our dear domestic friends. While I'm not in a position to build my own PET Property, I donated generously to Paws Humane here in Columbus. Their goal and mine is for them to become a no-kill facility as soon as possible. Paws is where I met my best little friend and I am forever thankful for that.

In January, I financed a Dog Park on our property...Condos.

Another concern and goal I have is to eliminate puppy-farms. The Pet-land chain is notorious for using them.

The local Pet-land is located on one of the busiest streets in town, and, as far as I can tell, has no vet on staff, while 'stocking' at least thirty real-cute by obviously miserable puppies two to a small cage with waste caked to their fur. No place for these pups to get either exercise or socialization. I saw all of this in my sole visit to the store...and hate it too much to return. Sickening. And to think this is how we treat our favorite animals!

I will be contacting you in a few days to see what we can get done.

-Raymond

[bdk1976]

Noble cause - I'd like to help, but we already do our part here on the opposite coast. In addition to only owning rescue dogs, we often have a 3rd (or 4th) dog around that we are fostering through local rescue organizations.

We host foster dogs until they are adopted. This keeps them out of shelters and safe, and also makes room behind them in the shelter they were taken out of.

It can be sad seeing some of them go after a while - although some have been adopted within a day or two, some we have had for 4-6 weeks and you can get quite attached. It can be a lot of work but we know we have saved and placed a lot of dogs over the past 10 years that otherwise may not have had a chance. It is really rewarding when some of the owners send up updates years later.

I would encourage anyone who is able to foster dogs for their local rescue if/when needed.

[jtschantz]

call me when you're up and running , and I'll donate

[forazzurri2axz]

my first tattoo ever!! our Princie-doggie


my princie doggie.jpg

[Nunzio11]

Very noble undertaking. Wish you the best of luck and look forward to hearing about your progress. My wife ran an animal rescue called RecycledLove for 14 years. No physical location so it was built around a network of foster families. We've had hundreds of animals through our house over the years. It became overwhelming with a full time job and family. We're still very active but had to release the reigns. The rescue actually took in a couple of the Vick dogs. They were all rehabbed and adopted out. The last dog just passed away some months back.

Animal rescue is so rewarding but at times is very disheartening. You literally see the worst of society. For every animal lover there's probably twice as many people that have no regard for living creatures. Those ASPCA commercials that you have to quickly turn the channel are real and probably somewhat tame. As much effort you put in doesn't make a dent in the problem and probably never will. It will take you places you never thought you'd ever go.

A couple words of advice. Having a physical location is huge but stick to your business model or you will be overrun. You can't save every animal. You're going to get calls from everyone with every sob story you can imagine, you have to be able to say NO. Expenses run up very quickly, quicker than donations come in.

Keep in mind though, matching an animal with a family is an incredibly rewarding experience. It totally outweighs any negative stuff you will go through and is the reason you're doing what you're doing.

Good luck and hit me up if you want to discuss.

[drcy]

My mom belongs to a local interchurch group that gathers and distributes food and clothes to local homeless. It is done with people from different churches doing it under the same network umbrella, but with no fixed home base. Just saying this to point out that you can have a network of like-minded people that help out and work together.

And, of relevant note, a few of the served homeless have dogs, so the network also distributes dog food.

[steve B]

Another group to talk to would be saveadog. http://www.saveadog.org/

One of our dogs came from them and was originally a foster dog we had. One that would constantly climb on my lap when it was football time. We already had one dog, so it took me a month or so to cave and ask if we could keep her.

A couple things I picked up from them, or from a newsletter by someone else.

A general rather than breed specific rescue is easier. For a few reasons, like the shelter staff not being good at identifying breeds.
Many kill shelters won't deal with rescue. Seems odd, but as it was put, the sheer numbers make the job pretty much suck. Adding some usually fanatical person who gets on them for working for a kill shelter and railing on about how every dog should be saved makes the job just that much worse.

I think saveadogs approach was setting things up in advance, arriving with space in the truck for "about x dogs" and asking the shelter staff to give them the most adoptable among the ones with little time left. They then drive to their area, and distribute the rescued to foster homes. That works well since there's less required in facilities, and the foster homes can give them an idea what the dog is like.

Either way, be open to there being a few that simply can't/shouldn't be rescued. Like large dogs that have a serious dislike of kids. That usually doesn't lead anywhere good.