The goal of this program is to get the community involved in helping the people and pets in our community who need it. APA's tagline is "Helping People Help Pets" and this program is the perfect example of that.
In addition to operating a hotline, we are also setting up a table at TLAC and are helping people who have gone there to surrender their pets, but perhaps could keep their pet with some help.
We are ready to grow the team so we can start advertising the program and really make an impact on the number of pets who are surrendered to TLAC. 40%, or approximately 8,000 by last year's intake numbers, of the pets who go to TLAC are owner-surrendered. A similar program in Richmond was able to send 37% of the pets back home with their owners when they were provided with counseling and resources. That's 3,000 pets we could keep out of our shelter!
Before we can advertise, though, we need a lot more volunteers to help. We need help in many different areas, here are just a few:
answering hotline
writing bios/taking photos of pets that need to be rehomed
finding resources in the community
providing resources, like behavior or medical help
talking to people at tlac who are willing to hold onto their pets just a little longer with help from us
Thanks to Dirty Dog for helping us with this program. They are hosting a meeting this Saturday, August 7th, at their dowtown Austin Urban Vet Center location from 2-4pm. We urge anyone who may be interested in helping with this program to come. The animals need our help!
