Pet and Wildlife Rescue (PAWR) officials say they don’t have the funding to send personnel out to retrieve live animals for their care.
This in response to a recent letter to the editor in The Chatham Voice, and a host of online comments on a local social media site.
Racheal Smith, in an Aug. 17 letter to the editor, which was addressed to two municipal councillors, was surprised to learn PAWR didn’t pick up animals in distress. She said PAWR personnel, once the animal was in their care, did a great job, but was upset the municipality didn’t provide funding for animal retrieval.
Online, PAWR took a beating from commenters on a local Facebook page, despite the fact Smith said in her letter, “I am NOT blaming PAWR.”
PAWR spokesperson April Colby said the funding just isn’t in place.
“With Pet & Wildlife, even the funds we receive for donations are going to caring for animals,” she said. “For us to pick them up, that would cut into our budget. We wouldn’t be able to do all our vet work and still maintain the care for all the animals.”
Since they took over from the OSPCA to care for strays, lost, and abandoned animals last November, PAWR has brought in nearly 2,000 cats, close to 400 dogs and about 60 other little critters, such as guinea pigs and rabbits.
Colby said the cats far and away are their biggest issue.
“Only 27 of the cats have been returned to their owners. That’s like one per cent. It makes me sad. We definitely have a feral cat problem. We definitely have a stray cat problem,” she said. “It’s in our contract to take in stray and feral cats.”
Of the 387 dogs PAWR has taken in, 167 have been adopted out and another 146 returned to their owners.
Colby said she and other PAWR officials can emphasize with the public over the issue of not picking up injured or ill animals.
“We can definitely understand people’s frustrations when they see a sick or injured cat and they wonder why we don’t go and pick it up,” she said. “But the municipality funds us to take in and care for stray cats, sick and injured cats and dogs and the little guys (guinea pigs, rabbits, etc.).
“We’re not funded by the municipality to go pick them up. If we do, we’re using funding for care and control of animals for something we’re not funded to do.”
Colby said the same is true when it comes to sick or injured wildlife, as the municipality doesn’t fund for that either.
“If it’s something people want, they should be talking to their councillors.”
Colby said PAWR does occasionally send out volunteers to get animals, if those volunteers are available.
Despite having “wildlife” in their name, they don’t care for wild animals, only domesticated ones.
“Even if someone were to bring in a raccoon, we’d have to transfer it to a regulated wildlife rehabilitation centre, one authorized by the Ministry of Natural Resources,” Colby said. “We have lots of great organizations (in Chatham-Kent) who take in wildlife.”
Those include Maynard Avian Rehabilitation Centre for birds and Hope Haven Wildlife Centre, she added.
Colby said running the animal shelter is one element of PAWR, but not all of what the organization does, as it works closely with the other animal groups.
“Our main goal is to give all the cats, all the dogs and all the little critters of Chatham-Kent a safe place to live. We can’t do that without working with all the other animal organizations in Chatham-Kent,” she said. “If the other organizations need help, they can come to us as well.”
She admits taking over the shelter has been an eye-opening experience for PAWR.
“We’ve had growing pains. We are coming from being a grassroots organization to taking in a level of animals we’d never worked with previously,” she said. “Plus, we are an organization full of volunteers.”
Colby said PAWR operates as a “zero-target shelter,” meaning they do not euthanize animals just to create space at the shelter.
“We euthanize when animals are ill. Our goal is to not euthanize healthy animals,” she said. “We’ll transfer animals if we have to.”
Colby encourages anyone with concerns with how PAWR operates to contact the organization directly.
“The Internet can be a cesspool of bad information,” she said. “It’s so easy to go on Facebook and find information you believe to be true.”
Colby said people can contact PAWR by phone at 226-996-9969; via email through its website, pawr.org; or through its Facebook page at facebook.com/pawr.org.
“We’re an open-book organization. We encourage people to come in and visit. We are part of Chatham-Kent,” she said.
It would be interesting to know how much PAWR is receiving from the municipality to attempt their job compared to how much the municipality was paying OSPCA to do the job. I suspect you are having difficulty because their is a huge difference between the two. If OSPCA couldn’t get the job done with the funding they get from the municipality as well as the provincial governmentn ($5 1/2 million annually), then it is ridiculous to expect anyone else to do the same with less.
At least PAW receives municipality funding. Other rescues in the area operate only on donations, and they DO get the job done. For example, Big Fix Grassroots Rescue-no budget; 100 cats in care right now, compared to 200 at PAW WITH significant funding. Big Fix does NOT euthanize, unless cats are terminally ill, and suffering-they do all they can to save lives; they will also, anytime of day or night, make every effort to come out to rescue an injured/sick cat; AND they run an affordable, very successful TNR (trap/neuter/release) program. Hmmmm-what’s wrong with this picture. I also very much object to the fact that PAW calls themselves a rescue-perhaps they need to re-visit the definition. Big Fix also has a strict adoption procedure-application/references/home visit, and follow-up. PAW has no such thing-pay your money, and you are out the door with an animal, and, from experience, they do not offer any follow-up if there are problems with the animal. So, what DOES PAW do with $600,000./18 months????
I adopted my dog through PAWR and I have papers that prove i adopted her, I have had Molly since she first came into PAWR . Everyone has neg things to say about all groups, When Molly was adopted i had 3 people from pawrs contact me to see how she was doing even after 6 months that i had her, now stop and think about it its not cheap to have ur animal fixed vets do cost money, so instead of NEg stuff why dont u go and vist where PAWR is at and see where the money goes instead of bashing them, its like all rescue groups it cost money for rent on building food for the animals vet care for the animals,