The Community Cats Podcast

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Ep236 - Dr. Linda Harper Feb 24, 2018

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Interview! Dr. Linda Harper, Clinical Psychologist, Compassionate Heart Specialist and Author

"Feeling compassion fatigue isn't really a matter of if, it's a matter of when. We naturally put ourselves on the back burner over the animals we help."

Dr. Linda Harper is a lifelong animal lover advocate, Author and Clinical Psychologist in the Chicago area. She is passionate about helping people help animals. She works to ease the compassion fatigue that animal lovers face in the animal welfare world and facilities pet loss support groups, as well. She is also the author of 4 books, her latest being "The Power of Joy in Giving to Animals." This book looks at the unique challenges people face who work with animals and contains many interviews with people involved with animals. She works to keep the joy within people who do this type of work, to make it as fulfilling as it was when they started!

When looking at burnout and compassion fatigue, there are many signs that can be present to watch for. It's important to note that it's not because a person is weak or has a personality deficiency, it's simply because of the unique challenge we face in the animal world. Feeling tired, not wanting to get up in the morning, getting sick more often, and experiencing more negativity are just a few signs that someone may be experiencing compassion fatigue and burnout.

So what is the first step to improve our feelings of being overwhelmed? We want to be able to share how meaningful and joyful this work is, so we have to work on taking care of ourselves! But the main step? Find compassion for yourself! We all need to remember that we're only human. How to find that compassion? Simple things by meditating for a few minutes every morning or turning off your phone after a certain time at night. Maybe going to bed earlier or finding an accountability partner will help. It is a matter of what YOU can commit to RIGHT NOW and you can do everyday. You know what you need, so only you can figure out what would be personally right for your lifestyle to find that compassion you need! Sometimes, the compassionate choice is simply saying no to adding on more to your plate.

We also need to watch for signs for the people we work with on a daily basis. If you're noticing a volunteer burning out, maybe it's a choice of not scheduling them for a bit to let them recharge? Many volunteers forget to take a "vacation" from their volunteer work. We need to remember that in order for compassion to flow naturally, it has got to come back to us!

Find out more at drlindaharper.com.

Ep235 - Kimberley Heeney Feb 17, 2018

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Interview! Kimberley Heeney, Vice President of Operations Active for Pets

"My goal is that anyone, anytime, anywhere, irregardless of economics or world areas, would be able to utilize Active for Pets for their pet's well-being and health."

With over 25 years of experience in the human healthcare industry, Kimberley Heeney brings a wealth of expertise to the Active for Pets team. She has always been passionate about helping animals who don't have a voice and has always had a pet, even while she worked in her old human healthcare role.The goal of Active for Pets is to identify, align and achieve objectives and is the first to bring a complete suite of medicine for pet owners with mobile health technology. It brings the benefits of humantelemedicine to pets with a unique and acute understanding of affordable, accessible and flexible pet health care for shelters and pet adoption.

When working in the human healthcare industry, Kimberley noticed that people don't always ask the right questions of their doctors. They don't seem to have a true knowledge of what they need when it comes to new medicines or tests. That's where the original Active Doctor came into play. People now have 24/7 access to all of their health history at all hospitals worldwide. Kimberley quickly saw the benefit of moving this to the pet world, as well. Enter Active for Pets.

Pet owners always want the best care for their "pet kids" and Active for Pets works with humane societies around the country to give vaccination, lab test results and allergy information at all times. The creation involved experts from veterinarians, animal shelters and rescues, who wanted an easy solution that gave easy access to people to be more engaged and aware of what they needed for their pets. It's about the wellness for the lifetime of a pet!

Active for Pets is a great way to manage all pet information, vaccination history, vet notes, vet visits, etc. It's a two-way connection where vets and others involved in a pet's life are able to include items about their pet. All a pet owner has to do is set up an account, log-in through their computer or a mobile app, and they can easily access their pet's information to share in case of an emergency or other needed moment.

Active for Pets also provides other support, like "Ask The Vet". It is a comprehensive list of information that people can use if they have a simple question that may not require and entire trip to their vet. It can also provide video feeds straight to a vet, so a vet could potentially see what is going on with a pet via video before heading in.

Right now, Active for Pets requires no financial commitment to shelters and rescues, as they provide this as a complimentary service to help these not-for-profit places. The main challenge they face is getting the voice out there. Feedback, however, has been phenomenal, so much that many corporations are even adding this to their employee benefit packages, as well!

Find out more at www.activ4pets.com.

Ep234 - Brianna Grant, Communications Associate at Alley Cat Rescue Feb 10, 2018

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Interview! Brianna Grant, Communications Associate at Alley Cat Rescue

"We believe in protecting all cats, no matter what area they are in."

Brianna was always involved with cats and found a particular sweet stray when she was younger that broke her heart with how bad of shape it was in. She spent the next few months taking care of this little stray and in the process, learned a lot about TNR and community cats. Because of this, her passion for animal advocacy was born!

When she went to school at Tutfts for her degree, she worked a lot with FIV+ cats and now she works with them at Alley Cat Rescue, as well. They focus on protecting domestic and free-roaming cats and are involved in animal advocacy at a local, national and international level.

A new hot topic that Alley Cat Rescue is working on in an advocacy campaign is the feral cat bounty program that has been implemented in Australia. Hunters can go out and kill cats and bring in their scars to the government for money! Clearly, there are many who are very opposed to this and find it counterproductive towards actually reducing the population. Right now, no hunters have claimed the bounty and Brianna is hoping that with the large scale media attention that is being targeted around this, it will bring the bounty to an end. Despite studies that have shown how effective TNR can be in Australia, the government still does not support it and instead is focused on funding other, more cruel ways to eradicate the cat population.

Currently, 137,000 signatures have been collected in an online petition about reversing this bounty and 16,000 of these have come from local Australians. Locals are worried about their domestic cats who may wander out and innocently get scalped for money by mistake.

For more information, head over to saveacat.org.

Ep233 - Ann Dunn Feb 03, 2018

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Interview! Ann Dunn, Founder of Cat Town, Oakland, CA

"Nobody wanted to be standing in a cafe making coffee, they wanted to be helping the cats. But now, we're seeing how helpful it has been to forgotten kittens and see how successful it has been."

Ann Dunn founded Cat Town, which is a cat rescue organization focusing on helping the most vulnerable cats in local shelters. Cats that are too scared in that environment have a hard time showing their best selves and soon tend to be overlooked by potential adopters. After realizing this, she wanted to work with these cats that needed the most intervention and save them from being euthanized. She opened the first Cat Cafe in conjunction with Cat Town in 2014 and just opened an adoption center for the hardest to place cats.

She worked for over 20 years in public housing redevelopment in managing, funding and planning. While she didn't grow up with cats, she did end up adopting 2 cats after college. It was in their memory that she started volunteering at the local animal shelter. She never imagined it would lead her to open her own rescue shelter and she soon became obsessed with helping cats. In this new venture, she saw opportunity to apply her professional skills to address the high euthanasia rate she saw with the higher risk cats who weren't having luck find homes. In 2011, Oakland had a 42% euthanasia rate, but by focusing on cats most likely to be euthanized, she has helped place around 1,800 cats and reduced the euthanasia rate to 14%!

Ann brought a different perspective to the problem when looking at the variables that were in play at an animal shelter. She saw obstacles that were in place that prevented some cats from feeling safe enough to be confident, which in turn, led them to not be adopted and often times, euthanized. Instead, she wanted to find a way to help by finding a way to place these cats in something other than a cage, where people could get to see them open up more. She originally was thinking this would happen in the form of a quasi sanctuary/adoption center/ cat cafe, so people would be able to spend time with these types of cats in an easier environment for the animals. She wanted to see these troubled cats find a "safe place" where they would transform into confident cats that people would want to adopt.

She now works on the Forgotten Kitten Project, as well. She uses a different approach with kittens that come in who may not be socialized because they are a little older. She brings them in and lets them become desensitized to an active environment, where they are amazingly resilient. It helps boost their confidence and gives them the skills they need to become more adoptable cats. She received a grant from Maddie's Fund for this, where she documents her findings in order to hopefully inspire other organizations to do the same thing and replicate this approach elsewhere.

Ann also participates in an apprenticeship program through Maddie's Fun, where she shares innovative ideas with other organizations. Cat Town is a host organization, where they have different organizations come in and shadow them, to see how they are doing things and what they can do to implement their ideas and success in their own organizations.

Find out Ann's thoughts on the Cat Cafe and what she would do differently if she had to do it again. Would she even open a cat cafe if she was starting all over?

Learn more at www.cattownoakland.org

Ep232 - Gavin Ehringer, Author of Leaving the Wild: The Unnatural History of Dogs, Cats, Cows and Horses Jan 20, 2018

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Interview! Gavin Ehringer, Author of Leaving the Wild: The Unnatural History of Dogs, Cats, Cows and Horses

"It's not enough to take care of animals after they're born, we have to think about their circumstances before the act of breeding even takes place."

Gavin takes a critical look at breeding and how our values shape our animals for good and bad in his new book, Wild. The book actually began about 5 years ago when he got the idea about writing about how animals came to be domesticated. He decided to put his entire life into the book and went out on the road in an RV and did research all over the United States for the book.

He looks at the history of dogs, cats, cows and horses and how they willingly left the wild in exchange for our care, along with how that relates to what they deal with now in modern times. He digs into what the consequences have been to them becoming domesticated.

For instance, with cats, the invention of kitty litter I the 1940's really changed the game for them becoming an indoor pet. A man was using a similar material to absorb oil on the floor of his garage when a neighbor came over and asked to use it for her cat. Voila, and industry was born! It completely changed the game for cats on becoming indoor pets.

Gavin also found interesting research around the millennial and their cat ownership rates. Cats have only recently surpassed dogs as America's most popular pet, and more than likely we can than the millennials for that! Because cats are easy to care for and fit into their urban lifestyles very well, adoption rates have skyrocketed with this generation. It also gives them social credibility by adopting through shelters and off the streets.

Believe it or not, Gavin didn't have a very positive view of community cats before he wrote the book. He viewed them as destroyers of wildlife. But after his research, he learned how TNR can be so effective and can be the long-term solution. He believes the whole community needs to get involved in these issues and there needs to be long-term discussions if they hope to decrease the amount of animals living and suffering on the streets.

To grab Gavin's book, head over to www.leavingthewild.com.

Interview! Nell Thompson - Coordinator of National Getting To Zero Program Jan 13, 2018

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Interview! Nell Thompson - Coordinator of National Getting To Zero Program

"I'm passionate for improving outcomes for community cats. I believe TNR would work great with cooperation and collaboration to achieve community change."

Nell has worked for over 25 years in the industry and her background is exceptional, due to her veterinary technician experience and knowledge that has heavily influenced her work every since. Her journey was heavily influenced by her parents, who volunteered in shelters when she was a kid and fostered cats and dogs as a family when she was young. The National Getting to Zero Program is in Australia and primarily focuses on homeless cats and dogs and they work to implement change in a respectful way. They work to increase responsibility for companion animals so that every community and municipality can achieve zero euthanasia of all healthy and treatable cats and dogs. Because they are in Australia, they take many methodologies and philosophies that we use here in the United Stated, and work to implement them there, since our cultures are fairly similar. However, the government been difficult to work with when it comes to community cats. For a variety of reasons, community cats are very maligned in Australia. While being aware of the environmental factors, all options for population management need to be looked at and best applied, but the government is more on board with killing the overpopulation numbers that are homeless. Community cats are persecuted in the country based on government standards. In most states in Australia, TNR is illegal. A lot of work has been done by locals to try to change the culture and work in more positive collaboration with the government, but so far, it has been a difficult road. In 2015, the government passed legislation to kill 1,000,000 cats, so the Getting to Zero program has been working in overdrive to get TNR up and running and to manage the population in a better way. What can you do to help? One of the biggest drivers of this program is communication. Just by talking to people it can help to alert them to what is happening in Australia and what the problems are. It can be hard to push through change, but sometimes you need to accept the discomfort that comes with this and push through it. For more information, head over to www.g2z.org.au.

Keoni Vaughn, Executive Director of Lanai Cat Sanctuary Jan 06, 2018

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Interview! Keoni Vaughn, Executive Director of Lanai Cat Sanctuary

"My job has helped me instantly get to the heart of what I want to do, which is rescue and protect animals that can't speak for themselves."

Keoni is the Executive Director of the Lanai Cat Sanctuary, and oversees a staff of only 6, who provide daily care for almost 600 cats! Prior to working here, he was the VP and Director of the Hawaiian Humane Society, where he worked hard to rescue animals. The Humane Society found themselves working as mediators in the midst of an abundance of free roaming cats on the islands, due to constant nice weather and a lack of natural predators. A bulk of his time there was collaborating with colony care givers and housing associations to mediate on how to best handle the overpopulation situations.

Keoni was born and raised in Oahu and has worked hard to position the sanctuary as the #1 place to visit in Lanai. He has worked with travel websites to create viral content that has increased the awareness of the sanctuary in the area. 95% of the sanctuary's donations come from visitors and a quick commuter plane or ferry ride will bring in tourists for a great day trip to visit.

When given the opportunity to work at the sanctuary, he jumped on it. Despite only having about 3,000 people on the island and it being remote, he was determined to help solve the cat overpopulation issue, despite the limited resources. Him and his team focus attention on where endangered birds live and breed, in order to create the safe environment they need. By using trail cams, along with help from the community, they are able to watch for the colonies and take cats they find to the sanctuary when needed.

Believe it or not, 95% of the cats that come to them from the island have never seen a human before! That is why it's also important for Keoni to work on socializing these cats, as well, which about 40% of them are doing well with at this time. Most adoptions they do make happen tend to come from off of the island, so it's important to work with the cats' socialization at the sanctuary on a daily basis.

He has also written an article about building sanctuaries in other parts of the country and what the tips and ideas are relevant that he would give. It can be a struggle, but he has learned how to be efficient. He discussed the many requests he gets to build sanctuaries in other parts of the country, but he is adamant about really being able to sit down and evaluate the specific scenario and to start slow!

For more information, head to lanaicatsanctuary.org.

Ep229 - Natalise Kalea Dec 30, 2017

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Interview! Natalise Kalea, CEO of poundWISHES

"We want to save animals, help animals, and better the lives of animals around the world. We aim to execute on our mission through creative innovation and community."

Natalise has always been an animal lover, who always dreamed of using her business skills and put them to good use. Now that she is the CEO of poundWISHES, she is doing exactly that!

Natalise is a graduate of Stanford Graduate School of Business, who did an internship between her first and second years that encouraged her to create an environment of impact in business. When she was younger, she regularly volunteered with Best Friends in Los Angeles, which opened her eyes to how many different programs needed funding. She remembers seeing people take in 5 to 10 animals at a time, which would only put them into debt. Because of this, she wanted to move into a role where she could directly impact the future.

poundWISHES is a crowdfunding platform for animal welfare non-profits that started about 2 1/2 years ago by a little girl who suffered from Leukemia. As a young girl, her family utilized the Make-A-Wish foundation, which always stuck with her. When her family adopted a pet from a shelter when she was 5, she remembered how sad the shelters were and wanted to create a "Make-A-Wish" foundation for them! When she was 12, her and her dad created poundWISHES to help these animals in shelters and elsewhere.

poundWISHES receives crowdfunding request for animals in need who may require surgery, medication, or transport. There are also crowdfunding items for natural disasters, or even things like the creation of a dog park!

It is similar to GoFundMe, but for animals and is much more hands-on. poundWISHES helps rescues craft and optimize their campaigns and shares campaigns to their community of over 90,000 animal lovers. They also highlight campaigns on their social media platforms, which allows shelters to not have to solely depend on themselves to get the word out.

Natalise shares tips on running successful campaigns, such as focusing on the quality and content of the story. Great pictures and videos are a must, along with successfully framing the story to bring an emotional response.

poundWISHES is also working to expand into the e-Commerce industry, similar to an Amazon Wishlist. They are aiming to be a one-stop-shop for rescues so they can strictly focus on the work they have to accomplish at their facility. Donors are able to contribute through physical items, along with monetary donations, allowing rescues to worry less about how they will fundraise and bring needed products and medicine in the door.

Learn more today at poundwishes.com.

Ep228 - Haydn Hilton Dec 23, 2017

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Interview! Haydn Hilton, Owner of Java Cats Cafe in Atlanta, GA

"If I would have known how much work a cat cafe was, I might have turned around, but the cats are where the magic is. They market the coffee shop all by themselves when people walk by!"

Meet 26-year-old Haydn Hilton, owner of Java Cats Cafe. This is Georgia's first cat cafe in the heart of Atlanta and definitely wasn't where Haydn expected to find herself! Initially going to school to be part of the film industry, she dropped everything to start this business and now enjoys giving advice and mentoring other female entrepreneurs looking to start a business in a male-dominated society. Her business also support local charities and she enjoys being a positive influencer on social media.

Because her cafe can't cook their own food directly in the cafe, Haydn farms out the work to a local homeless charity, where the people work in a kitchen creating the food that the cafe receives on a daily basis. What a great way of giving back to the local community!

Haydn was always involved in animal rescue growing up. It's in her blood to be very caring towards animals. When she was younger, she spent about a year doing TNR with her family at a neighbor's abandoned barn that had a large population of barn cats left behind. The cats ended up hanging out at her family's house after that and the 20 cats that stayed were like a dream come true to Haydn. She developed a real passion of working with feral cats to tame and nurture them.

But she didn't expect to make a career out of it! She was a senior at Georgia State and was in a film class, where she learned about a cat cafe and was immediately drawn to the idea.She quit school, left her job, learned how to be a barista and started the long journey of opening up Atlanta's first cat cafe!

Java Cats Cafe is heavily regulated and cats are partitioned in a completely different area. People come into the coffee shop portion, where they can purchase what they want to eat or drink, or just pay a fee to go straight into the cat area. People than can sit in a room with up to 20 cats that are all up for adoption. Who wouldn't love that?! The fee is than used to help support the local shelters that supplies the cats in the cafe.

Haydn also discusses the entrepreneurial struggle and how hard it was being a woman to just get into renting spaces. She had a really hard time getting taken seriously, which has caused her to start awoman's entrepreneurial group at Java Cats to make sure that other women can find the support they need. She wants people to feel safe to share the struggles of what happens trying to open the business, while potentially finding a much needed mentor.She also does special activities and events in the cafe. Woman's clothing swap, game nights, paint class, movie night, documentary series, and many other things that brings the community and women together with a bunch of different interests to support the cause.

Haydn also discussed the pros and cons with using Kickstarter to help raise her initial equity.Because she wanted to get things open, she needed to get money on the table ASAP. She also wanted the publicity to make sure she was being taken seriously. Which worked. However, between taxes, fees and other things that get taken out, you need to make sure it's actually worth going through the work of setting up a crowdfunding area.

She completely believes in the idea of cat cafes, though. Java Cats Cafe has already doubled the adoption rate with cats with PAWS Atlanta. People can see them right away and have a more natural exposure that happens at the cafe. It's more of a playground for cats, rather than the sad environment many shelters tend to have. It's a game changer for cat adoption!

Learn more about Java Cats Cafe at their website, javacatscafe.com, or on Instagram and Facebook.

Ep227 - Frances Carlisle Dec 16, 2017

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Interview! Frances Carlisle, Attorney

"An important and usually neglected part of estate planning is what will happen to a client's pets and animals. Charities which are already overburdened than have to step in, taking resources away from their other needs."

Frances Carlisle is an attorney in New York that prepares wills and trusts, along with trusts for animals. She was one of the original members of the New York City Bar Animal Law Committee and has appeared on Animal Planet to discuss the importance of estate planning for continuing care of animals, as well!

Because animals can't be a beneficiary, but there are two different ways to provide for continuing care after something happens to a pet owner:

Leave an outright bequest for a fund to take care of the animal - This may be where a family member would take on the burden. A pet owner could set up a fun for the person to help defray the cost of care for the animal. Frances also suggests having 2 or 3 names to make sure that if your #1 choice suddenly can't take the animal, there is a back-up.
Creation of a trust for an animal - This offers more protections for the animal. This would name your animal as a beneficiary through a trustee, who will ultimately be in charge of overseeing everything for the duration of the pet's life.

While working with an attorney may be too expensive for some, there is a new mypetwill.com website, where you can create these items relatively cheap.

Frances also discusses the option that pet owners may want to consider looking into sanctuaries for pets that are long-living and may outlast a pet owner's lifespan, such as horses or other larger animals. A sanctuary or stable would be a great option to find something that is likely to be around for the lifetime of the animal.

It's also important to think about what a pet owner would do for an extended hospitalization or was suddenly incapacitated. It's necessary to work on an arrangement where someone can immediately feed and care for an animal. A power of attorney may be needed, in these cases. She also recommends carrying a card in your wallet that gives directions on what to do in case of emergency with pets that may be at home. In the case of community cats, a caretaker may want to make sure they give detailed locations and descriptions of where they feed and take care of a colony.

Finally, Frances discusses how to consider what to do with your pet when they die. It's important to make sure they are properly taken care of not only in life, but in death!

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