The Community Cats Podcast

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Dave Hanley, CEO of Tomorrow May 04, 2019

Show notes

Dave Hanley, developer of the Tomorrow app, is an entrepreneur who is also a pet (and human) parent. Tomorrow is designed to help anyone set up a legal will quickly and easily—and even appoint guardians for their pets and/or children. The app is free, with no strings attached. (It is funded by the optional sale of life insurance products.)

Dave's own love for cats began as a child when his parents gave his older sister a kitten one Christmas. Since then, Dave has always felt a connection to cats and currently shares his home with two twin sister cats. He was inspired to create Tomorrow after learning that 50 million children are not protected by legal guardianships providing for their care. Dave's experiences in wading through his own parents' outdated estate plans and documents after their deaths provided additional motivation to develop the app, which he hopes will encourage everyone to protect themselves and their families with these important documents.

One experience that really stuck with Dave after his mother's death was the challenge of finding a new home for her cat. The process took him and his siblings quite a while, and the whole time, he felt certain that someone in his mother's retirement community would have taken the cat in—but neither he nor his siblings had any idea who might have been willing, because they had never had that conversation with their mother, nor had his mother ever noted the information anywhere. The Tomorrow app would have solved all that, had it been available, as it not only allows you to set up guardians for your pets, it also allows you to enter important information about them and their health, diet, etc.

Dave encourages everyone to have conversations about what will happen to your pets, children, and assets after your death. "It's not dark," he tells Stacy; "it's just having a plan."

You can learn more on the Tomorrow website , or you can download Tomorrow through an app store—it's available for both Apple and Android phones.

Kate Hurley, DVM, Director of U.C. Davis Koret School of Veterinary Medicine and Co-founder of Million Cat Challenge Apr 13, 2019

Show notes

You may remember Dr. Kate Hurley, Director of U.C. Davis Koret School of Veterinary Medicine and co-founder of Million Cat Challenge, from CCP Episode 47. If not, be sure to check it to hear all about how Dr. Hurley got started in the world of animal welfare.

In this episode, Dr. Hurley is back to talk with Stacy about the amazing success of the Million Cat Challenge (MCC) program that she co-founded with Dr. Julie Levy three years ago. Dr. Hurley talks about what she calls a "stunning transformation" that has taken place in the field of animal sheltering for cats since last time she was on the show, beyond anyone's wildest dreams. Not only did the MCC hit its goal (a year early!), the program has seen many shelters decrease their euthanasia rates by 80-90% after joining the MCC. These shelters have saved over a million more cat lives compared to their own baselines before joining the MCC.

Stacy and Dr. Hurley discuss the specifics behind the numbers, and how the MCC was set up to amplify successes that were already happening in animal welfare. The idea was to connect people with each other and to make the progress that is happening for cats more visible in order to inspire both commitment and hope. The program has definitely done just that, with nearly 1,311 fewer cats being euthanized per day in the United States now. "This can be the new norm for cats," Dr. Hurley believes.

She goes on to discuss what's next for the MCC, which is "the right outcome" for every single cat that comes to a shelter in North America." She hopes that CCP listeners will help out by visiting the MCC website, making sure that their local shelter is enrolled in the program—and if not, stopping by and taking with them about it!

To learn more, visit the Million Cat Challenge website. You can see if your local shelter is a participant by clicking on "Who's Involved." You can also check out Dr. Hurley's recent webinar presentation on Cats, Birds, and Animal Shelters: Seeking Common Ground.

Nikki Martinez, Trapper, Foster Mom, and Feline Welfare Activist Apr 06, 2019

Show notes

Nikki Martinez was always a dog person. That all changed one day when a kitten ran in front of her car on her way to a post-surgical doctor appointment. Feeling down and overly focused on herself after her surgery, Nikki poured her heart and soul into nursing that sickly kitten back to health, and eventually found it a new home. In the process, Nikki herself began to heal—and she found herself hooked on helping cats.

Today, Nikki fosters kittens, serves on the board of directors for a Las Vegas TNR organization called C5, traps community cat colonies with C5, manages a popular kitten Instagram page, and runs a side business called Fostering a Purpose. She specializes in caring for critical care and neonatal kittens, and has fostered hundreds of kittens over the years. It took her a while to see the connection between the kittens she was fostering and TNR, but once she did, she devoted even more of her energy to TNR. As she put it, "I'd picture a bucket that's overflowing with water, maybe it has a hole in it and the water's gushing out. You can either mop up the water, or you can put a plug in the hole—and TNR really puts the plug in the hole and stops these cats from breeding on the street, which ultimately stops kittens from suffering."

In this interview, Nikki and Stacy talk trapping—strategy, trap and bait preferences, how to handle injured feral cats, whether there has ever been a cat Nikki couldn't trap—and even using plumbing "snake" cameras to assist with trapping. Nikki loves working as a volunteer trapper for C5. "It's such a satisfying feeling to know that these colonies of cats won't be breeding anymore," she tells Stacy.

Nikki also has an Instagram account for her foster kittens as a way to share knowledge and information about cats and cat overpopulation with folks who can't help but click on her cute kitten pictures. The page has blown up and Nikki sees it as a great way to get people involved in fostering and TNR. As a result of her Instagram page and interest in purchasing and selling merchandise there, Nikki started Fostering a Purpose. The company sells high-quality cat-related apparel for people and donates a portion of the proceeds to feline welfare causes.

As part of C5, Nikki has been part of a big change for community cats in Las Vegas over the past decade. The group has TNRed over 35,000 cats, and since 2009, the euthanasia rate at the local municipal shelter has gone down an astounding 90%. "It's just a small, simple organization with volunteers, making a huge impact in Las Vegas."

To learn more, you can follow Nikki and her foster kittens@myfosterkittenson Instagram, visit the Fostering a Purpose website, or check out the C5 website.

Danielle Bays, Director of Cat Protection and Policy, HSUS Mar 30, 2019

Show notes

Danielle Bays, Director of Cat Protection and Policy at the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), is a frequent flyer here on CCP, having appeared before on Episode 55and Episode 261. She joins Stacy again here to talk about what's going on across the country for cats, and about various events happening in the animal welfare world this spring.

One such event is HSUS'S annual Animal Care Expo conference, being held this year in New Orleans on April 15-18. Danielle tells Stacy that not only will there be a cat track again this year, there will also be a day-long program devoted to kittens, and lots more about cats within the other conference tracks, like behavior and veterinary. Jackson Galaxy will be at the conference as a speaker on cat behavior, and also as part of a roundtable session with attendees. There will be a session in the veterinary track about FIV and FeLV, which will discuss everything you need to know to get those cats adopted like any other cat in your shelter! Several sessions on trapping will also be included, including one focused on return to field, one on how to deal with large-scale colonies, and one on "cat counting."

Stacy and Danielle also review the 2019 legislative update for cats, including several declaw initiatives making their way through the channels and how people can make the declaw issue a more pressing one for their elected officials. There is also interesting cat-related legislation happening in South Carolina and Illinois, and Danielle feels that each year, the "temperature" for community cats gets better and better across the United States. "We're just seeing such great work throughout the country," Danielle tells Stacy. "These ideas that we have about how we handle cats in shelters, how we treat cats outdoors, are really gaining so much traction."

To learn more about HSUS, legislation, and the Animal Care Expo conference, visit animalsheltering.org. You can also can get in touch with Danielle directly at dbays@humanesociety.org.

Dr. Mikel Maria Delgado, Cat Behaviorist Mar 23, 2019

Show notes

Dr. Mikel Maria Delgado, a Certified Applied Animal Behaviorist with a Ph.D. in psychology, has quite a list of accomplishments under her belt. She has co-authored the book Total Cat Mojowith Jackson Galaxy, and she currently co-owns a cat behavior consulting business called Feline Minds, which assists both pet owners and shelters. Mikel is also a post doc fellow at the University of California at Davis doing research on cat behavior in multi-cat households and on the health and development of orphaned neonatal kittens.

Mikel was, in her own words, "obsessed with cats" even as a child, though she never had particular aspirations toward being a vet, and it never really occurred to her until much later in life that she could have a job working with cats. Soon after the death of a beloved pet cat, Mikel began volunteering at the San Francisco SPCA, an organization with a robust cat behavior program. Mikel was hooked and ended up working for the SFSPCA for eight years before leaving to pursue her education.

Today, Mikel and her business partner work on many feline behavior cases, most of which, Mikel tells us, are due to an under-stimulating environment. She explains that keeping cats indoors restricts their experiences, and if you don't replace those outdoor experiences with something else stimulating, it will lead to behavior problems.

Mikel is also conducting some fascinating research on cats—all of it either on pet cats in their homes or on foster kittens in the pre-existing UC Davis neonatal kitten foster program. (In other words, there are no lab cats here!) Tune in to hear the details of Mikel's research and how it may help future cats and kittens in homes and shelters.

For more information,visit Mikel's website, or you can follow her on Twitter @mikel_maria.

Karen Anderson, Animal Communicator, Afterlife Expert, and Coach Mar 16, 2019

Show notes

In this interview, Stacy speaks with Karen Anderson, an animal communicator and afterlife expert who has been practicing for over 20 years. She has received several awards and is a best-selling author of several books as well, including her most recent, The Amazing Afterlife of Animals.

As far back as Karen can remember, she has always loved animals. They were her very best friends and for many years, she thought everyone could understand and talk to them the way she could. It wasn't until she worked in law enforcement many years later, however, that her animal communication abilities really came forward in a big way. She has no formal training as an animal communicator, just a very deep love of animals. In fact, Karen feels that anyone can learn to communicate with animals, and that you don't need any special skills. "I can teach most people how to send their first message in 15 minutes; that's how easy it is," she tells Stacy.

She and Stacy go on to talk about overcoming negative and doubt-filled thought patterns, and Stacy shares why animal communication has been in her own toolbox for many years now—and why she feels people should be willing to consider it. Karen tells Stacy that most of her clients come to her either during the hospice process, or after they have lost a beloved pet. She loves to work with people going through these incredibly difficult periods and is constantly amazed by how just one message from a pet can bring so much peace and healing to those who are grieving.

To learn more about Karen, her work, and her services, visit her website, or find her on Facebook. You can find her books such as Hear All Creatures! The Journey of an Animal Communicator, The Secret Inner Life of Pets: A Leading Psychologist and an Animal Communicator Bring You the Love and Wisdom of Animals, and Amazing Paranormal Encounters Volume 2 on Amazon and Audible.*

*As an Amazon Associate The Community Cats Podcast earns from qualifying purchases.

Kim Saunders, Operations Director, Liberty Humane Society Mar 09, 2019

Show notes

Kim Saunders was a practicing attorney when she decided to move into the animal welfare world full-time (after years of volunteering). She spent 15 years at Petfinder before moving into a more hands-on role at St. Hubert's. She is now the Operations Director at Liberty Humane Society (LHS), the only licensed animal shelter in Hudson County, NJ, which one of most densely populated counties in the state. Hudson County has rich cultural and socioeconomic diversity, with 15% of the population falling under the poverty line. LHS provides all animal control services, as well as shelter and adoption services to the county.

In this interview, Stacy and Kim discuss how the recent government shutdown has impacted shelters, particularly pet retention programs. Kim is passionate about keeping animals that already have a home in those homes, and LHS offers a flexible pet retention program that assists with whatever people need—from super basic supplies like crates and litter to more complex needs like intensive medical care. During the government shutdown, LHS collaborated with another area group to make sure that the needs of local pet owners facing shutdown-related difficulties were being met.

LHS has also recently added a Community Cat Coordinator to its staff. This role, which is currently about 80% outreach, is tasked with coordinating and expanding the subsidized community cat spay/neuter program LHS began last year. They have a mobile spay/neuter clinic and they partner with another New Jersey group to provide services on that vehicle to both community cats and owned pets as well. The Community Cat Coordinator is in charge of community outreach regarding the spay/neuter program and community cat issues in general, and LHS plans to allow the position to grow and change to meet the current needs of the local community.

Liberty Humane is always glad to share what they're doing and to hear about what others are doing. You can learn more about them or get in touch via their website.

Elena Battles, Shelterluv Mar 02, 2019

Show notes

Elena Battles of Shelterluv software has been working for animals in one capacity or another since 1999. It was then that she found Trini, a stray beagle who truly changed her life. Elena had been working as a physical therapist, but after rescuing Trini, she was re-awakened to the issues facing animals, and decided to change paths. She began volunteering, then moved on to several staff roles in animal welfare organizations all over the country. Now, at Shelterluv, Elena helps provide those in the animal welfare world with access to the technology she wishes she had when she worked in a shelter.

Elena knows that working in animal welfare operations is much more complex than just working with animals, so she is so excited to be able to give people the technology tools to help make that job easier. She tells Stacy that considering making a change in systems often starts with asking some important questions about your organization (and she shares what those questions are).

Elena & Stacy talk about configurability vs. customization, and the move towards getting animal welfare software systems to "speak" to each other. Elena also discusses the fact that as far as cost goes, there are a wide range of choices in animal welfare shelter platforms. If you're thinking about animal welfare software—whether for the first time, or as a change from your existing system, this interview has some great tips for you. In addition, Elena is happy to give you her advice and point you in the right direction, even if it's not to Shelterluv.

To learn more, visit the Shelterluv website or email Elena. You can also find Shelterluv at many animal welfare conferences, like HSUS and Best Friends.

Kay Stout, ED of PAAS Vinita Feb 23, 2019

Show notes

Kay Stout is the Executive Director of PAAS Vinita in Oklahoma, a multi-faceted group that grew out of the initial shelter that gives the group its name (PAAS stands for "Peaceful Animal Adoption Shelter"). Back in 2015, the shelter opened, but no one was coming in to adopt the animals. That's when Kay realized they had to do something different. She reached out to animal welfare contacts and soon had a transfer program set up with Dumb Friends Animal League in Colorado.

Today, the group continues large transports of dogs, as well as occasional transport of cats, to Colorado, but it also serves as a local resource center. PAAS offers spay/neuter services to local cats, a TNR program, and is also helping many groups work toward 90%+ save rates through the Save Lives, Unite Oklahoma project.

Kay and Stacy talk extensively about the history of PAAS, including Kay's successful early strategy of getting a handful of community leaders onboard with what she was doing. Having these people on her side made it easy for her to move her programs forward without encountering a lot of pushback.

Kay feels strongly that folks in animal welfare need to do their best to find common ground with the people they are trying to work with. If that doesn't happen, she tells Stacy, progress stops, and may never start again—and that means that lives of cats and dogs waiting to be rescued may be lost.

To learn more, you can visit the PAAS Vinita website. To learn more about Save Lives, Unite Oklahoma, contact Kay at director@paasvinita.com.

Sandy Rees, Arf Club Founder Feb 16, 2019

Show notes

Sandy Rees, the CEO (Chief Encouragement Officer) at Get Fully Funded and Founder of Arf Club, joins us for her second visit to Community Cats Podcast. If you missed her first chat with Stacy, check it out here.

Sandy's company shows passionate nonprofit leaders how to fully fund their big visions so they can spend their time saving lives instead of worrying about money. Based in Loudon, TN, Sandy teaches her students to focus on donor outreach, authentic messaging, and relationship building in their fundraising.

In this episode, she talks with Stacy about some of the current trends she's seeing in fundraising for the small nonprofit (hint: think videos!). She also gives some great tips around what constitutes "authentic messaging," shares a simple ratio to follow to prevent donor fatigue, and reminds everyone that acknowledgment of donations is "a simple thing, but it is…a critically important thing."

The Arf Club portion of Sandy's business is an animal welfare-specific fundraising training program, designed to teach rescues and other animal nonprofits how they can raise the money they need to fully fund their budgets. Arf Club shows you how to put the principles of donor-based fundraising in place. The program even includes follow-up, with specialized nudges about when you need to start thinking about or working on particular campaigns. Sandy has just opened up a way to sample what Arf Club has to offer for just $17 that you may want to check out!

To learn more, visit the Arf Club website or the Get Fully Funded website.

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