Every year, loving dogs and cats end up in municipal shelters or other animal control agencies on Long Island and throughout the US. In 1981, LAST HOPE, INC. (aka, LAST HOPE ANIMAL RESCUE) started to save- what were called- “death due pound animals.” At that time, Long Island town shelters were killing adoptable pets at a great rate. A team effort of local government with not- for- profit rescues and a public outcry allowed us to make great strides in reducing the euthanasia rate and improving the in- shelter care of animals in our municipal shelters.
LAST HOPE continues to assist our town shelters by accepting dogs and cats from five Long Island municipal facilities. Shelter managers bring pets in need of special veterinary care, such as orthopedic surgery or heartworm treatment, to our attention. We help provide as many as we can with necessary medical services or surgery before placing them with a loving family. Veterinary care can cost thousands of dollars in some cases. Since 2009, we have extended our mission to help rescue dogs from high kill shelters in the South. We partner with several Southern shelters, transporting highly adoptable dogs to the Northeast that would definitely be euthanized for space in these poor, rural areas. One April weekend, we took 12 dogs from two overflowing Southern shelters that were begging us for help. Beagles and other hunting dogs discarded there are easily placed here.
In the past year, we have taken numerous cats from our municipal shelters to curtail their overload, and to enhance the cats’ adoptability by being in our smaller venue. In September, we responded to pleas from a Miami shelter that had a huge influx of cats during Hurricane Maria. We worked with North Shore Animal League of America to bring these displaced cats to our Adoption Center. The Florida hurricane cats are in Long Island homes. Later, there were 16 cats brought to Islip Shelter when their caretaker went into a nursing home. Their adoption chances would improve with our volunteers socializing them. We brought five of these frightened but loving cats to our Adoption Center.
In recognition of LAST HOPE’s original 1981mission, we are declaring April and May “Shelter Rescue Months”, and are targeting our upcoming Bowlathon on May 6th at Levittown Lanes to raise needed funds for our ongoing shelter work. If you cannot attend, please consider giving a donation of any amount to the shelter rescue effort.
Thank you,
Linda Stuurman
To purchase tickets to our Bowlathon, please go to the event page on our website using this link:
http://lasthopeanimalrescue.org/last-hope-bowlathon-sunday-may-6th/
To make a donation to Last Hope online, please click the “Donate” button on our website. You can use the link here:
http://lasthopeanimalrescue.org/donate-to-last-hope/