News
Economic problems trickle down to affect BDAR's operations.
February 2009 - Recently, Black Dog Animal Rescue has felt the residual effects of the downward trend in our economy. While news of layoffs all around town have headlined our local paper, BDAR has struggled to maintain our foster parent program. As you may know, BDAR is currently run entirely out of foster homes. That means that we do not have a central location, such as a shelter, that houses the animals we rescue. Instead, generous animal-loving people open their homes and hearts to these homeless pets until a forever home is found. Without these foster homes, all of the animals you have seen on our web-site would have died, as we only take those at immediate risk of euthanasia. Our volunteer foster homes are the heart of our operation and without them, we simply cannot continue to do the work we so love.
Unfortunately, the month of January has proven very difficult for us and our foster homes, and we have lost every single foster home we were working with. This happened for different reasons, but you must understand that we only had four to begin with. A year's worth of marketing and campaigning helped us find these four wonderful homes to work with, but there really weren't enough to sustain us for the long run. Two of our foster parents were subject to some of the many lay-offs around town and can no longer afford to care for animals in their care. One had to extend her hours at work to make ends meet. I myself am having a baby any day now and feel that I should wait on a new foster dog (we have three of our own) until baby has been established at home a little. So, what does that mean for BDAR? Well, if you look at our adoptable's page, it means that we can't rescue any more homeless pets at this time. We simply have no place for them to go.
BDAR's foster program has been a large success so far. Those four homes, plus an occasional one that only decided to foster one dog, resulted in the saving of some 50 dogs from area WY shelters since last February! Imagine what we could do this year as we become better organized and word starts to get out about the work we are doing! Fostering requires that you review and sign a contractual agreement, attend an orientation session, and provide shelter and care for an animal in your home until permanent placement is found. BDAR provides food and covers the medical costs of these animals. We also strive to be a constant source of support and information as bringing any new animal into the home generally results in some growing pains. If you are interested in seeing us save more animals, and in watching the No-Kill solution become successful in Cheyenne, please contact me at britney.wallesch@bdar.org for more information about the foster parent program. We need your help!
We are a small organization run solely on a volunteer basis and funded entirely through donations. BDAR came into existence because of a strongly held belief by its founders. Namely, that no animals should be euthanized in shelters because of population restrictions or because of the length of time it may take to find a permanent home. That said the following mission statement has emerged as a summary of the present and future goals of BDAR.