August 2000Success Stories
Despite the challenges they face, animal-welfare groups have many success stories to share. Nicholas Carter sees Border Collie Rescue's Birdstrike Control Program as "an all-around positive venture." He explains:
We are helping to save dogs (as funds generated help support the entire rescue organization), as well as saving the lives of birds (that avoid being hit by airplanes), saving money for the airlines, consumers, and the general population (by reducing the costs of birdstrikes to aircraft), and potentially saving people's lives (by making air travel safer for the flying public). It's a win-win situation, no matter how you look at it. And though we cannot assist every Border Collie in need across the country, it gives us pride to know that we are accomplishing our small part in this tremendous undertaking.
Carole Sanders tells of a wounded Akita that Animal Angels rescued. "Magic" was adopted two years later "and lived happily ever after. This is what we are all about."
Richard Hoyle takes satisfaction in knowing that the pigs living at the Mini-Pigs sanctuary "are happy and healthy. All have been rescued from lives of horrible abuse or saved from slaughter."
Shirley McGreal notes that the International Primate Protection League is "helping primate rescue centers in many countries with funds and volunteers and we have many tales of animals who would otherwise have died, but who are living happily in spacious enclosures. We have provided 80% of the running funds for the Limbe Wildlife Center in Cameroon. … Recently we gave phone advice and funds to a Thai sanctuary taking care of an injured baby gibbon and we have been told that our help was a major factor in his survival."
Ann Seidner of Cats Exclusive echoes McGreal's sentiments:
The best part of running our organization is the satisfaction that comes when we adopt a cat out to a good home. We are a no-kill shelter and once we take a cat in, it stays until it is adopted out. … It is also very satisfying when we are able to get feral cats spayed/neutered and re-released and maintained by caring volunteers. In 4 years, our organization has been responsible for spaying and neutering more than 3,000 cats and adopting out more than 750 cats.
Sandra Farnik, director of the Clarence Foundation, of Darien, Illinois, reports:
We are 3 years young and provide service dogs free of charge to disabled children and adult recipients. We adopt our pups/dogs from humane societies and animal rescue groups. … These are formerly unwanted dogs[;] many would be put to sleep. Volunteers provide tlc and these pups are nurtured into becoming helpers to disabled children/adults. These dogs can perform up to 70 tasks to aid their recipients in going to school/work, shopping, household help, etc. This is the BEST part of working with The Clarence Foundation, [the] full circle of dogs aiding their new owners.
Supporters of the Ramapo-Bergen Animal Refuge in Oakland, New Jersey, are excited about the shelter's new Pet Emergency Assistance Program (PEAP). According to Karen C. Russo, vice president of the board of trustees, PEAP "provides temporary, short term care for the pets of individuals facing a medical emergency. The program takes a proactive approach to pets at risk of being left homeless."
Michael Mountain sees "the fact that the number of homeless pets being killed in shelters every year has now dropped to five million [from fifteen million in 1987]" as "remarkable evidence of what has been achieved in the last decade." Supporters of the Best Friends Sanctuary "now believe that No More Homeless Pets is a practical goal [that can be achieved] by the year 2010."
Linda Deveney, treasurer of the Good Mews Animal Foundation in Marietta, Georgia, celebrates the six extra years of life the foundation was able to give an abused cat named Dillon. Debbe and Dave Evans, vice president and treasurer, respectively, of the Fancy Cats Rescue Team in Herndon, Virginia, tell of Charlie, a cat whose owner had just died and who was scheduled to be put to sleep because the vet thought he might have cancer. Charlie wasn't in pain, so Fancy Cats took him. He is still alive today.
CANTER's Jo Anne Normile writes of Make It Happen, a thoroughbred who won a race in 1999 but was awaiting slaughter the following January. CANTER bought "Happy," nursed him back to health, and found a new home for him.
In the end, it is stories like these that sustain the people who work with animal-welfare organizations. For Shirley McGreal, "the best part" of her work with the International Primate Protection League "is the time I can spend in hands-on care of our 31 sanctuary gibbons. They are a constant source of motivation and have kept me functioning for 27 years without burning out."
For Nicholas Carter, "the best part of running our organization is the knowledge that [we] are helping dogs in need." Carole Sanders notes, "People ask, how can you let them [rescued animals] go after caring for them and loving them? How can we not[?] Every animal in our care deserves [its] own home and family."