FOTAS Partners with SPCA to Make Possibility Reality for County Shelter

All that exceeds FOTAS’ accomplishments are our possibilities!  Here are a number of recent reasons for our optimism.

Yesterday, FOTAS held its second Woofstock Festival of Mutts and Music.  With the weather forecast, sponsor/vendor/exhibitor support, and community interest as predictors of success, it must have been spectacular.  All of the proceeds from the event will be invested in our new shelter.

Last month, accompanied by some very special adoptable dogs, FOTAS engaged the community on the needs of our County Shelter at St. Mary’s Chocolate Festival and Fall Steeplechase.  More than 5,000 unwanted, mostly adoptable, dogs and cats a year are still coming into a grossly inadequate facility.

Since January FOTAS has transferred 431 dogs to no-kill shelters up north. They move through an unbroken chain of relationships from our inadequate shelter to volunteer foster homes, to transfer partners, to the love of responsible, well-vetted homes. 

Combined with our county adoptions, we are saving twelve- to fifteen hundred pets a year, and still seven out of ten animals coming into the county shelter die there. 

Naturally, we cannot build, adopt or transfer our way out of this heart-breaking reality.  The real solution to the horrific euthanasia rate of impounded animals is to address the problem at its source: the elimination of unwanted litters of puppies and kittens through spay/neuter and responsible pet ownership.

Beginning last spring, through an opportunity offered by Pawmetto Lifeline in Columbia, FOTAS volunteers moved deliberately and actively into facilitating low-cost, targeted spay/neuter services through the new Spay/Neuter Assistance Program (SNAP). 

Wagener area citizen’s response to the program was huge and saw that more than 80 cats and dogs were fixed before funds were exhausted in Columbia.  That is when Aiken SPCA stepped up to the plate and became the critical partner for FOTAS SNAP in Wagener, picking up the surgeries for an additional 50 to 60 animals.

FOTAS and Wagener owe a huge debt of gratitude to Gary Willoughby, the SPCA’s executive director, who dedicated private funds received to continuing two spay/neuter transports of up to 20 animals each to their clinic this month.

As FOTAS continues to expand SNAP, piloted so successfully in Wagener, to other county trouble-spots, the SPCA will be ramping up their surgical capacity in the new Albrecht Center.  The partnership emerging between the two organizations has the potential to move our county ever closer to never having to euthanize an adoptable pet!

There are so many ways you can help us achieve this goal.  One way is to make a donation to our Capital Campaign for the new county shelter.  Another is to write a check to FOTAS-SNAP and help fund targeted spay/neuter with the SPCA.

Or, now that the cold weather is upon us, the county shelter badly needs warm blankets for its current residents who are relegated to the overflow pens. 

Donate: dollars, food, or blankets.  Volunteer.  Foster.  Adopt a shelter pet.  Help make the possibilities realities.  We need you; in fact, can’t do it without you.   

 FOTAS Volunteers work with the AIKEN COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER, 411 Wire Road.  For more information, contact “info@fotasaiken.org” or visit FOTAS on line at www.fotasaiken.org 

Aiken County Animal Shelter:  “By the Numbers”

October 29^th thru November 4^th     

Received: 50 dogs and 44 cats!

Adopted: 10 dogs and 2 cats

Euthanized: 27 dogs and 34 cats

 Aiken County Shelter “Pets of the Week!” So much LOVE for so little!

 

Jazmine - Boxer/Mix: Walks well on leash. OK with cats.

 Only $35 

 

LOONEY – 3 yrs 13lbs  Siamese mix female. Gorgeous! Prefers to be only, or top-kitty.  Yours for only $35.                              

*All adoption fees include: Spay/Neuter, heartworm test, all shots, worming, and microchip.

FOTAS Begins Year Four with an Annual Meeting and Celebration

On August 18^th, FOTAS celebrated its volunteers, accomplishments, and its vision for the future at our third annual meeting for members.  The meeting highlights are worth sharing for those who wonder what we have been up to.

The 2012 FOTAS Annual Meeting was billed as a “Potluck Snack Celebration,” and nearly forty stalwart members braved the midday heat on the grounds of the County Shelter.

Borrowed tailgate tents were pitched in front of Herby Brown, the 1979 Airstream converted to FOTAS’ signature Rescue Waggin’, and the podium was the ramp to C.A.T.S. (Cats at the Shelter), a lovely adoptable cat colony, another FOTAS contribution to the County Shelter.

Three tables covered with food, iced beverages in coolers below, entertained the attendees until the meeting was called to order. 

The FOTAS treasurer report was an appropriate launch to the meeting/celebration: FOTAS has no debt, and no real overhead as an all-volunteer organization.  This allows all of the money raised, after expenses, to directly benefit the county’s homeless animals.

In addition to Herby and C.A.T.S., here are some additional ways FOTAS has invested over $75,000 in the county Shelter to date:

·       Commercial Laundry Equipment

·       Large dog Play Yard

·       Stainless Steel Cage Banks for surgical recovery

·       Grooming tub and table

·       Platform Scale

·       Renovated the Autoclave for surgeries

·       Toys, treats, food, flea & tick treatments and shampoo

·       Kennel decks and Kuranda beds to get the dogs off the concrete

FOTAS has also raised enough money to fulfill its commitment to the County in the MOU for the new shelter construction: the county makes the funds for the building a priority and FOTAS pays for the Architectural and Engineering costs.

 FOTAS has over 1000 members and roughly 75 active volunteers with both lists still growing. Our volunteers realize FOTAS’ mission by:

·       Making shelter animals more adoptable with training, exercise and TLC;

·       Fostering mamas and puppies or kittens, babies without mamas, and special needs cases;

·       Organizing and staffing fundraisers like our benefit breakfasts, golf tournament, Hunter Pace, Giving Parties, and, of course the grand event: Woofstock Festival of Mutts and Music (to be augmented this year by better weather, a Mutt Strut and, we hope, another Motorcycle Ride-to-Woofstock on 11/10/12);

·       Staffing adoption events at Petsmart and local businesses;

·       Establishing and expanding our Spay Neuter Assistance Program (SNAP) to target local communities; and,

·       Maintaining our database, website, social media, thank-you-note and canister program, and writing this column.

In short, FOTAS is volunteers and donors.

The meeting ended with the introduction of two new board members, Frank Townsend and Joanna Dunn Samson, our own banker and lawyer to help steward our growing pains. 

FOTAS’ mission is, in part, to help the Aiken County Animal Shelter be a healthy, happy place where no adoptable pet has to go to die. 

Last year 5,011 unwanted animals came into our shelter, FOTAS helped the county shelter save 1,652 or 33%.  Now that’s worth celebrating.

  FOTAS Volunteers work with the AIKEN COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER, 411 Wire Road.  For more information, contact “info@fotasaiken.org” or visit FOTAS on line at www.fotasaiken.org

Aiken County Animal Shelter:  “By the Numbers”

FY 11-12	City of Aiken	Aiken County
Imp. Dogs/Cats	656	5,011
Ret. to Owner	143	307
Trans /adopted	159	1,345
Euthanized	376	3,808

Aiken County Shelter “Pets of the Week” are HALF PRICE*!

MAY – Lab mix, 42 lbs. A real doll and your new best friend for only $35!

KINDLE – Baby male Siamese mix.  He’s a rare beauty for only $35

 

Herbie Brown Represents the Best of Who WE Are!

Herbie Brown’s story is still unfolding.  A 1979 Airstream Landyacht , Herbie has been recently transformed into FOTAS’ state-of-the-art Rescue Waggin’.  How he got his name, his amazing career change, and what he will be doing, are all long stories, but considering what he will be up to in the next couple of months, well worth highlighting.

For over 25 years, the travel trailer belonged to Bert Davis’ uncle, Herb Brown, who traveled among Airstream enthusiasts as far away as Mexico, and who ultimately lived out his final years as a widower calling his beloved RV home.

“My uncle loved this trailer and he liked to help people,” Bert said, and then he did everything he could to help FOTAS get the project going.  Bert was so generous that we named the trailer after his uncle.

Herbie Brown now sports thank-you notes to his major benefactors on each rear corner.  The first are only initials of anonymous donors who funded the project.  Then he acknowledges Ernie Wolf who assembled the first crew for gutting, and basic electrical work.  There’s Robert McBrayer, who spent a few weeks with

metal patches, silicone, primer, more primer, paint and plywood securing the windows, sealing leaks, covering wheel wells, installing subflooring, priming and painting the interior a brilliant fun yellow.

Ken Simmonds did the most exquisite job of laying vinyl on the floors and up the walls that you’d think royalty would be traveling, not dogs.  Eric Figueroa of Premier Metals created the secure generator housing on the trailer’s fork so the animals could have light, music, and climate-controlled travel, winter or summer, wherever they go.

Don Bush was the brilliant craftsman who designed, constructed, and installed the four pens and their wire mesh doors.  It was no small task to get the wood to accommodate the irregular curve of aluminum interior walls designed like an airplane fuselage. 

Anthony Goehl, a recent transplant to Aiken, primed, painted, and sealed the pens so that animals who travel can find clean, healthy accommodations for every voyage.

Herbie is ever grateful to Charlie at Tyler Tire who was under Herbie in a downpour; to Sherwin Williams for the advice, primer and paint; and to Ron at Signworks who designed the messaging on Herbie’s exterior so that wherever Herbie goes FOTAS’ message will be very clear: “Rescue, Adopt, Spay/Neuter & Love!”

Soon, Herbie will be re-stationed between the C.A.T.S building and the main county shelter waiting to be called into service.  On May 26^th, he will be the star of Friends of the Animal Shelter’s march in Aiken’s Memorial Day Parade, along with volunteers with adoptable county shelter dogs. 

On Saturday, June 16^th, we hope Herbie will be the “Kitten Caboose” at FATZ Café, with Senior Vet Tech Sandy Larsen offering adoptable kitties at FOTAS’ first “Breakfast at FATZ for County Shelter Cats!”

Be proud, Aiken County, we are a community making a difference!  Just follow our latest miracle, Herbie Brown, who reflects the best of who we are!

  FOTAS Volunteers work with the AIKEN COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER, 411 Wire Road.  For more information, contact “info@fotasaiken.org” or visit FOTAS on line at www.fotasaiken.org

Aiken County Animal Shelter:  “By the Numbers”

For April 23rd thru 29th 2012  

Dogs taken in: 75!

Cats taken in: 37

Dogs adopted: 14

Cats adopted: 7

Dogs & Cats euthanized: Way too many!

Aiken County Shelter “Pets of the Week” 

WILLOW – An eager beagle, 4 yrs and 27 lbs. She will entertain and accompany many good walks.  $70

 

GYPSY – Gorgeous gal! A purrfect companion who doesn’t need to be walked! $35

One Citizen, One Program, and a Step Forward for Spay/Neuter

If you cringe at “By the Numbers,” or don’t even look, 70 dogs were euthanized week-before-last at the County Shelter.  In one day, thirty-five homeless dogs came in.  The staff is scrambling to find foster homes while bursting with unwanted mama cats with kittens.  The SPCA received a transfer of one cat with a litter of ten! 

When intake numbers explode, with the obligation to receive them all, not nearly enough space, and the requirement to keep strays for five days, too many potentially lovely pets have to die.  We can’t adopt out, transfer, or house indefinitely, so many animals. Not even a new shelter can fix that.

If Aiken County Animal Services were to join the top echelon of community shelters around the country that don’t euthanize adoptable pets, it will be due to aggressive spay/ neuter programs, essential components of an appropriate animal shelter.  There is no other way to bring the intake numbers down to a level where animals that come in stand a reasonable chance of finding a good home.

Last year the veterinary community of Aiken County rose to the occasion with their Stomp Out Strays Program, contributing their services for spay/neuter to pet owners needing financial assistance.  The demand soon overtook their capacity.

Aiken County dedicates $30,000 dollars each fiscal year to subsidize spay/neuter with the County Spay/Neuter Voucher Program.  The shelter makes the vouchers available at the first of each month, and there are never enough.

Even with the spay/neuter assistance programs funded by Aiken County and private organizations such as SPCA, too many pet owners, especially those in rural areas, do not know about, how to qualify for, or cannot even pay the minimal fees necessary to take advantage of the assistance. 

Then along came Carol, a woman who cared enough about this problem to try and address it, and who backed up her commitment with personal funds to get a program started.  She called her initiative SNAP: Spay Neuter Assistance Program.  Since January, SNAP inaugurated collaboration between FOTAS, the County Shelter, and the Aiken SPCA, who administer the funds.  The SPCA provides its own vouchers to the county shelter, which added its own innovation: most of the SNAP vouchers are handled directly by the county officers in the field.

Animal control officers have direct contact with the neediest households to benefit from spay/neuter financial assistance, especially those with multiple animals.  Until SNAP, the officers could only refer them to one of the existing programs. 

Chief Enforcement Officer Bobby Arthurs recommended providing the SNAP vouchers to his officers so they could give them directly where needed.  

Since January, 75 vouchers have been distributed.  Of those, 24 surgeries have been performed at SPCA and 33 more surgeries are scheduled.

Carol cared enough to start SNAP.  We need your help to keep it going.  As of this summer the SPCA will be able to do 1000 surgeries a month.   Imagine the possibility!  If this is your issue, send FOTAS a check with “SNAP” in the “For” line, or go to the FOTAS website under “Donate.”

 FOTAS Volunteers work with the AIKEN COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER, 411 Wire Road.  For more information, contact “info@fotasaiken.org” or visit FOTAS on line at www.fotasaiken.org

Aiken County Animal Shelter:  “By the Numbers”

For April 9 thru 15, 2012 

Received: 58 dogs and 31 cats

Adoptions:  13 dogs and 3 cats

Euthanized:  70 dogs and 21 cats

Aiken County Animal Shelter Pets of the Week

Adoption fees cover shots, worming, heartworm test, microchip and spay or neuter!

CODY – 1 yr/60 lb Boxer mix.  This guy is a darling! $70 is a steal of a DEAL!

JINX – 3yr gorgeous male kitty.  A perfect companion for any home.  $35!