2023 Open Arms Challenge

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

We try our best to get them involved in any fundraising events we have just to let them k ow what we are currently doing.   Sometimes it's hard to get them to participate.  We are rural as well.

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

Susan, I'm not sure where you are, but in PA the PA state police just set up "cruelty Liaisons" in each region of the state.  I am at a shelter and farm sanctuary also in a rural area and we have a fantastic liaison.  Perhaps you could check into your state doing the same thing?  it's working very well here in PA!  I hope this helps!  

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Mary Withrow
Executive Director
Heal Animal Rescue

Original Message:
Sent: 04-02-2023 05:53 AM
From: Susan Clay
Subject: Work with Law Enforcement on Animal Cruelty

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

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Susan Clay
The Martha Decker Memorial Fund for Animals
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April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

Hi we are a small rural rescue.  Our county officers and I communicate very well with each other on our cases.  With us, everything has to go through them first and then we are called to either assist or to help in any way we can.  We keep each other updated on different situations in the county. We are a small county so all calls that go through the sheriff's department gets sent to a deputy but also, we get a call, this way we are able to either decide that we need to assist or if they can handle it.  We get a lot of calls of loose/stray dogs (which we pick up), injured animals, some but not a lot of abuse/neglect calls (which both the sheriff's department and we respond to), any bite calls the sheriff's department handles first (we respond only if they need assistance with the animal).  It helps that we have great interactions with them and they assist us just as much as we assist them.  

We are the only rescue in our area and are very small, but feel that the more we work with our local law enforcement the better for us.

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

Hi Trina, 
Thanks for your response. It is wonderful you have such a good working relationship with your law enforcement people. Knowing they will reach out to you for your assistance does set the mind at ease. We're beginning to see that in some of our communities, and the more we connect with the law enforcement agencies, the more it benefits both the animals and people working so hard in rescue.
Thanks again.

Hi we are a small rural rescue.  Our county officers and I communicate very well with each other on our cases.  With us, everything has to go through them first and then we are called to either assist or to help in any way we can.  We keep each other updated on different situations in the county. We are a small county so all calls that go through the sheriff's department gets sent to a deputy but also, we get a call, this way we are able to either decide that we need to assist or if they can handle it.  We get a lot of calls of loose/stray dogs (which we pick up), injured animals, some but not a lot of abuse/neglect calls (which both the sheriff's department and we respond to), any bite calls the sheriff's department handles first (we respond only if they need assistance with the animal).  It helps that we have great interactions with them and they assist us just as much as we assist them.  

We are the only rescue in our area and are very small, but feel that the more we work with our local law enforcement the better for us.

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

Novastar does not get support from the law enforcement officers when dealing with animal situations.   We actually had a severe case of abuse going on and the officer told us there was nothing they could do.  After 12 hours of phone calls by our supporters and emails to the mayor, we were able to save the puppies on the property.   Again we are very remote and there is no animal control in our town.  So most dogs run the streets until we can catch them.    I wish we had more support. It sure would be helpful.  We invite the officers to our events in hopes they would see the things we do but response has been nonexistent.  We will keep trying.   That's all we can do. 

Hi Trina, 
Thanks for your response. It is wonderful you have such a good working relationship with your law enforcement people. Knowing they will reach out to you for your assistance does set the mind at ease. We're beginning to see that in some of our communities, and the more we connect with the law enforcement agencies, the more it benefits both the animals and people working so hard in rescue.
Thanks again.

Hi we are a small rural rescue.  Our county officers and I communicate very well with each other on our cases.  With us, everything has to go through them first and then we are called to either assist or to help in any way we can.  We keep each other updated on different situations in the county. We are a small county so all calls that go through the sheriff's department gets sent to a deputy but also, we get a call, this way we are able to either decide that we need to assist or if they can handle it.  We get a lot of calls of loose/stray dogs (which we pick up), injured animals, some but not a lot of abuse/neglect calls (which both the sheriff's department and we respond to), any bite calls the sheriff's department handles first (we respond only if they need assistance with the animal).  It helps that we have great interactions with them and they assist us just as much as we assist them.  

We are the only rescue in our area and are very small, but feel that the more we work with our local law enforcement the better for us.

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

Hi Laura,
First, thank you for taking the time to offer your experience. It can be so very frustrating, and I hear that also from some of our rescue partners in our  same area. One thing I read in a previous reply was about how the law enforcement was asked to take part in their activities. I think we'll take that a step further and "include" them in activities where their participation is part of the activities (if that makes any sense??). Actually have an event which law enforcement participation is the event.

Your statement "We will keep trying. That's all we can do" is so very true, and applies to so many things in rescue work, doesn't it?
Thank you again.

Novastar does not get support from the law enforcement officers when dealing with animal situations.   We actually had a severe case of abuse going on and the officer told us there was nothing they could do.  After 12 hours of phone calls by our supporters and emails to the mayor, we were able to save the puppies on the property.   Again we are very remote and there is no animal control in our town.  So most dogs run the streets until we can catch them.    I wish we had more support. It sure would be helpful.  We invite the officers to our events in hopes they would see the things we do but response has been nonexistent.  We will keep trying.   That's all we can do. 

Hi Trina, 
Thanks for your response. It is wonderful you have such a good working relationship with your law enforcement people. Knowing they will reach out to you for your assistance does set the mind at ease. We're beginning to see that in some of our communities, and the more we connect with the law enforcement agencies, the more it benefits both the animals and people working so hard in rescue.
Thanks again.

Hi we are a small rural rescue.  Our county officers and I communicate very well with each other on our cases.  With us, everything has to go through them first and then we are called to either assist or to help in any way we can.  We keep each other updated on different situations in the county. We are a small county so all calls that go through the sheriff's department gets sent to a deputy but also, we get a call, this way we are able to either decide that we need to assist or if they can handle it.  We get a lot of calls of loose/stray dogs (which we pick up), injured animals, some but not a lot of abuse/neglect calls (which both the sheriff's department and we respond to), any bite calls the sheriff's department handles first (we respond only if they need assistance with the animal).  It helps that we have great interactions with them and they assist us just as much as we assist them.  

We are the only rescue in our area and are very small, but feel that the more we work with our local law enforcement the better for us.

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

Hi Susan.

Garden City is a small city in Ada County Idaho. Most all the other cities renewed their contract with the only shelter in the county, but our mayor decided it was too expensive, so he left us without support. Because we are, or were, a community of many trailer parks and low income, we have had an enormous growth of cats throughout our history. That's why Garden City Community Cats Project needed to do something for the many caregivers in our compassionate community who care for these cats. The police were told not to answer or act on any calls concerning cats. So GCCCP handed out our business cards and contact information to the police force and told them to hand this out to anyone needing help with their Cats. Our main objective is to help any caregiver that has a colony of cats so that we can help them with food and offer free spay and neutering or TNR for any cat in Garden City.

We were thrilled to hear that an officer was feeding his own colony of cats in the back of the precinct! We immediately introduced ourselves and have been working with them on their own cats for two years now. We give them food monthly and always check to see if there are new cats that we need to catch and spay or neuter. It has made our relationship rich and rewarding.

Out of this we grew a conversation with the mayor that might lead to renewing the contract with the Humane Society, and the city lets us store our food for our many caregivers in one of their utility yards.

Sometimes it's counterintuitive to ask an adversary if they need help but maybe that's the quickest way to success.

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials? 

Hi Susan.

Garden City is a small city in Ada County Idaho. Most all the other cities renewed their contract with the only shelter in the county, but our mayor decided it was too expensive, so he left us without support. Because we are, or were, a community of many trailer parks and low income, we have had an enormous growth of cats throughout our history. That's why Garden City Community Cats Project needed to do something for the many caregivers in our compassionate community who care for these cats. The police were told not to answer or act on any calls concerning cats. So GCCCP handed out our business cards and contact information to the police force and told them to hand this out to anyone needing help with their Cats. Our main objective is to help any caregiver that has a colony of cats so that we can help them with food and offer free spay and neutering or TNR for any cat in Garden City.

We were thrilled to hear that an officer was feeding his own colony of cats in the back of the precinct! We immediately introduced ourselves and have been working with them on their own cats for two years now. We give them food monthly and always check to see if there are new cats that we need to catch and spay or neuter. It has made our relationship rich and rewarding.

Out of this we grew a conversation with the mayor that might lead to renewing the contract with the Humane Society, and the city lets us store our food for our many caregivers in one of their utility yards.

Sometimes it's counterintuitive to ask an adversary if they need help but maybe that's the quickest way to success.

April is Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month..
How Do You Work with Local Law Enforcement to aid cruelty/neglect cases? In  rural area, response can be slow.  Have you worked in any way to increase the positive interaction with your local  law enforcement officials?