Randolph County Animal Shelter: Cat Chow Building Better Lives Grant Report

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

Reduced adoption fees; medical care for one cat in order to restore his health and make him adoptable with a reduced adoption fee

Increased our cat adoptions; made our staff, who are cat lovers, very happy; and saved one cat's life (we would not have been able to pay for his medical care without the grant).

How many pets did this grant help?

20 so far, but we are still offering 10 more cats at the reduced rate.

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

Lazarus was being fostered by one of our volunteers. She called frantic on a Saturday to report that the cat was lethargic, not eating or drinking and was sleeping all the time. I met her at the vet’s office. Normally we would not have been able to spend much money to restore this cat’s health. We impound close to 6,000 animals annually. We are a county shelter operating on a tight budget. I knew this was a great cat who would make a wonderful pet, so I authorized the vet to take reasonable steps to find out what was wrong with Lazarus (his name at the time was Yellow Moon in Chinese). We spent $267.25 on fluids, medications and tests. Lazarus had a virus that would have taken his life without the support provided by the veterinarian. We would not have been able to find him a home with an adoption fee of $267.25, so we used our grant funds to reduce his adoption fee to our normal fee of $65. He bounced back, got a new name and, within no time, had a new home with an owner who appreciates that he’s already used up one of his nine lives.