Dear Friend of Pet Network,
I’m Jamie Fitzpatrick, the Executive Director at Pet Network Humane Society, and I’d like to show you what we have been up to in these turbulent times.
When I joined Pet Network in November, I was hired to help our organization grow and improve. We had already been doing good work, but we knew we could do more.
I spent my first six months getting to know our organization, using my experience from working in shelters for the last 18 years to strengthen our foundation for life saving. When learning about our shelter, it was obvious that Pet Network had a lot going for it; an important mission, talented and committed staff, strong community support, and the foundation for robust lifesaving programs.
While Pet Network is a no kill shelter, we are not a no kill country, and Nevada is not a no kill state. Knowing that thousands of animals are still dying in Nevada shelters each year, motivated us to act.
How could we expand our ability to help and say yes to more animals in need? It became obvious very quickly that a significant barrier to being able to say yes to more life saving was our physical space. Our shelter only had THREE dog kennels for new arrivals or dogs who need isolation for medical treatment, but conveniently, just on the other side of the hall was our boarding facility with TEN full sized dog runs!! These kennels were utilized by owned dogs who used our organization’s boarding and daycare services.
By saying yes to providing boarding & daycare to these dogs who already have loving homes, we were having to say no to homeless dogs who might otherwise be at risk of euthanasia.
The prospect of saying goodbye to our boarding clients and this relationship with a portion of our community was extremely difficult. But at the end of the day, our mission is to save animals who are at risk of euthanasia, and closing boarding and daycare allows us to expand that mission and save more dogs like Ti-Bo, pictured here.
So at the end of May we moved forward with big changes, announcing that our boarding and daycare services, which had been closed since mid March due to COVID-19, would not be reopening.
Fast forward two months… It’s now the beginning of August, and where are we? Still in the middle of a pandemic, but still saving lives. And saving more lives than before.
In the two months since we closed boarding & daycare, we have doubled the number of dogs we have transferred in from under-resourced shelters, offering them a safe place to get ready for their new homes.
Change is hard. But at Pet Network we’re committed to saving lives and when I look at the faces of the lives we are saving, I know without a doubt this is what we are meant to do.
Thank you for taking the time to get to know what’s going on at Pet Network and for your support of our mission. We hope you’ll join us by donating, volunteering or fostering a dog or cat in need. Feel free to reach out to me with your thoughts by emailing jfitzpatrick@petnetwork.org.
Jamie Fitzpatrick
Executive Director
Pet Network Humane Society
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