Animal Welfare Professionals

For 2 years I worked at the only no kill shelter in my area. I truly found my passion in life while I was there. Unfortunately, I disagreed with a lot of choices the current manager is making and continues to make. I still foster kittens for them so I’m still aware of what’s going on. They treat it more like a pet store than a rescue and I have no hope in trying to change anything; the board of directors doesn’t care. My point in all this being, my dream is to start my own no kill rescue organization. I’m familiar with a lot of things in the rescue world, but am looking for advice or to talk to people who have started their own rescue. 

That is my dream too. Following (:

I am working on starting a non-profit rescue myself, though it's for birds of prey. I've done some extensive research on the subject and may be able to help. Feel free to give me a shout

Thank you so much! Do you have an email I could reach you at?

Absolutely! cborquist@fmtn.org

@Terri Any words of wisdom you can share?

I have no experience in starting a rescue, so I am no help there. I do want to pose a suggestion though. I have heard that starting a rescue can be lots of work to get going. It could be a year or 2 before you have your own rescue. In order for you to continue saving lives in the meantime, is it worth it or possible at all for you to have a sit down with the manager? I have been the manager on the other side of this and found that I either didn't roll out a change effectively or clearly or perhaps missed a step but I've never done anything with the intention of putting our animals in a bad place. I too am passionate about saving lives and I would like to think that manager is also there for the same reason even if the "how" is different from how you think it should be done. Considering your board of directors support this manager, it sounds like they may have very sound reasons for making the changes they have but just like me in my early days, maybe just implemented the changes poorly or didn't give a clear explanation as to why the changes were necessary. What do you think? Do you think you can reach out to get more clarity on what is going on? I am only throwing this out there because some volunteers chose to leave without finding out what was really happening and let miscommunications get the best of them.

It depends on what type of advice you're seeking. Check out joangarry.com for nonprofit leadership advice if you need it. She has a leadership lab and tons of articles, a podcast, and a book -- all helpful! I also recommend the book Multipliers as a jumping off point with regards to leadership. If you have animal-rescue specific needs, other than Maddie's Fund, Best Friends is an amazing resource, as you likely already know -- but just in case. We felt the conferences have been worth the investment if you're able.

There are a ton of resources out there and knowing what topics you need help with, specifically, might help others point you in the right direction. 

Good luck! 

Best Friends offers a workshop on how to start and run an animal sanctuary. You can find more details here.

Starting a rescue or non-profit of any kind is work.  Hard work.  But, it usually is a worthwhile investment of your time.  I will suggest a book called RESCUE MATTERS! by Shelia Webster Boneham, PhD as a reference.  I started my 501 in 2013 and got my exemption really quick from the IRS as we were planning to do less than $30/year for the first three years.  Note that this is not what happened...we took in over $50k the first year so BE PREPARED for the possibility of plans not happening like you thought.

We are no-kill due to being totally owner surrender of puppies less than 6-mo old in the beginning.  We were not set up for adults or medical cases at the time we began and we thought 400 animals a year was a lot of animals to help.  We did not realize when we started how much time and effort doing direct adoptions would take from our two foster/volunteer families (it was just us and our husbands).  We were mostly transporting out animals after initial basic vetting, but the adoptions brought in more revenue than transporting as the upstream rescues didn't want to reimburse very much and would only take puppies between 8-11 weeks -- it just covered the basic vetting not holding costs like food for the dogs, or extra time in rescue due to mange or ringworm, parvo treatment, etc.  Although they were able to pay themselves nice salaries, we were (and still are) totally volunteer choosing to put any extra monies into spay and neuter in our community.  If you have to have a full-time job, how are you going to fit rescue into that?  You have a lot of 24/7/365 phone calls, requests via facebook and email -- how will you deal with that if you have to work, too?  So, with that said, have you looked at costs?  Do you have a plan for where your animals will reside until adoption?  Are they staying in foster homes?  Are you prepared for doing all the fundraising, treasurer roll, decision making for which dogs to take and which to turn away?  What are your issues with the current shelter?  How would you fix them and how will you address them in your proposed rescue?  I agree with the person who asked you to talk to the current shelter about what you are having issues with -- there could be a good reason for the way they are doing things (and there may not!).

We now intake and move out about 2,000 animals a year (5 years later) and do very few, if any, direct adoptions.  We have found excellent Humane Society partners who reimburse us enough to help us not only with vetting but with our program that provides for spaying momma dogs who remain with their owners.  These big groups are in it for the dogs and puppies and work tirelessly in their own communities with animal issues.  In addition, they take our momma dogs and their litters, heartworm positive dogs, behavior issue dogs (not aggression issues), but the main thing they re-home for us is puppies up to 6-months of age.  We are inundated with unwanted puppies here and, if we don't transport them out of here, there would be that many more animals around to produce puppies themselves.  So, we determined that our mission was to relocate the next generation of breeder animals (puppies) and spay/neuter what remained in place.  We were all over the place for the first years wanting to do everything -- adults, medical cases, geriatrics, anything that the shelter was going to euthanize, etc., but we found that, once we figured out what we were really good at, it worked better for us!  So, I say to you, what is your mission?  how will it fit in with what others in your community are doing and help the overall issue in your community?  Are you just duplicating someone else's program?  If so, is there enough adopters in your community to take animals from all of you?  What will make your program different that others?  What will make donors want to give to you instead of someone else?  It is sad to say, but rescue doesn't happen without money coming in -- unless you are personally extremely wealthy!  It is great that you want to do rescue the way you feel it should be done...that is a great thing for your community to have passionate people!  I know that the 501 stuff is just the tip of the iceberg and there is a lot of work once you get it.  In addition, most grant organizations will not grant $ to rescues who have not been in existence for more than 2 years.   They also require you to keep a lot of financial records, data on what you as a rescue have done in that time, etc.  Do you know what you will use to track that data?  Will you choose a shelter software that produces reports for you like for loading info into shelter animals count?  Will you use Excel?

There are so many questions to ask and not all the answers are easy.

Are you going to start a rescue for cats or both cats and dogs?

I co-founded Fearless Kitty Rescue 6 years ago and I can share a lot with you about how hard it was (and still is) to run a no-kill cat rescue.   I can tell you all the reasons why it's not worth doing and if you still decide to do it, then you passed the first test  That's not meant to sound like a deterrent or negative but you need to know what you are really getting in to.  Be prepared to make a lot of personal sacrifices (time and money) because that's where it will start.  Be prepared to be in over your head during your very first kitten season because that's what every kitten season presents.  Hope that you don't get ringworm before you know how to handle it because that alone can shut your rescue down.   Be prepared to never have enough funding to pay your bills and know that along with caring for animals every day - every day you are going to need to fundraise.   They go hand in hand if you start your own rescue. 

And then there is coming up with your name and logo - remember you have to do that if you are starting a rescue from the ground up, it's a bit harder than most people think.   There is a reason our rescue name has the word "Fearless" in it, we knew from the start that's what it was going to take from us to do what we set out to do.   And put on your superwoman/superman cape, you are going to need it.

If you are able to attend the Best Friends conference in L.A. in July, that would be a great place to learn a lot of what you are going to need to know AND meet amazing people who will inspire you to start your own rescue from the ground up because IT CAN be done.  I will be there if you'd like to meet or email me at kim@fearlesskittyrescue.org if you want to chat more. 

I hope you do it and I wish you nothing but success!