Fearless Kitty Rescue: COVID-19 Operation Grant Report

How did this grant help your organization and the pets in your care?

We used the funding we received to support our foster program going from part-time to full-time during COVID-19.

This grant was incredibly helpful to us because, when COVID hit, we were forced to close down our brick-and-mortar building so that we could keep our volunteers and staff safe. In March we (like everyone) had no idea what was happening; all we knew was that we had to be very cautious and very responsible. We placed the 50 kitties we had in our building into foster care; it was a challenge because our foster program only had a budget for a part-time position, and we had to increase the number of hours our foster coordinator was working in order to grow our program so we had homes for every kitty.

How many pets did this grant help?

86

Please provide a story of one or more specific pets this grant helped.

Mabel was born on March 21, 2019. Her introduction to life was not the best. She had been dumped in a Home Depot parking lot in Mesa with her two siblings. Luckily for them, a kind lady from Apache Junction found them and contacted us. They arrived at our rescue in April 2019. She lived at our rescue for about a month until a grandmother with eight grandchildren fell under her spell. She was adopted on May 29, 2019.

At this point, we all hoped this sweet little kitten had finally found her forever home. Unfortunately, her story does not end there. Almost a year to the day later, we received a phone call from her adopter stating that she could no longer care for Mabel as she (the adopter) had developed a rare blood cancer and lupus.

We have always had a policy with the rescue that, if for any reason you can no longer care for your cat, we will take the kitty back, no questions asked. So on the June 2, 2020, a scared little cat returned, not knowing why this had happened.

For a few days, she was placed into one of our habitat rooms that are set up almost like a living room in a home for observation. Unfortunately, Mabel was showing signs of reverse socialization and fear. We kept an eye on her as she continually hid under blankets and away from people. We decided that a foster situation would be the best scenario for her recovery. Because of the grant we received, we had just the right foster person who could not only take Mable, but give her the additional socialization she needed.

At the foster’s home, she lived in her own bedroom for about two weeks as she slowly came out of her shell. Then she started to show strong interest in the other cats who would constantly visit her from the other side of the closed door. She had lived a solitary, cat-free life for almost a year. It was an almost instant integration success once she met the other kitties and finally, she came out of her shell.

A week later, the foster decided to adopt her, and she became a permanent member of that family in July 2020.