Rethinking Rescue

Rethinking Rescue boldly confronts two of the biggest challenges of our time–poverty and homelessness–in asking the question: Who deserves the love of a pet?

In Los Angeles’s most underserved communities, Lori Weise is known as the Dog Lady, the woman who’s spent decades caring for people in poverty and the animals that love them. Long before anyone else, Weise grasped that animal and human suffering are inextricably connected and created a new rescue narrative: an enduring safety net empowering pet owners and providing resources to reduce the number of pets coming into shelters.

Rethinking Rescue: Dog Lady and the Story of America’s Forgotten People and Pets unites the causes of animal welfare and social justice, moving between Weise’s story and that of the larger U.S. rescue movement. Through captivating storytelling and investigative reporting, Carol Mithers examines the consequences of bias within this overwhelmingly white movement, where an overemphasis on placing animals in affluent homes disregards pet owners in poverty. Weise’s innovative and ultimately triumphant efforts revealed a better way.

As cities across the country witness some of the worst housing crises in history, and as the population of unhoused people and pets continues to skyrocket, Rethinking Rescue offers a story of compassion and hope.

You can buy your copy on Amazon or download it on Audible https://a.co/d/fYDSqQz

Support your local bookstore  https://www.dieselbookstore.com/book/9781640095984     https://www.vromansbookstore.com/book/9781640095984

 

Summer Fundraiser!

Join us Sunday June 30th for our summer fundraiser.  Tour our mobile clinic and Cat Box Clinic, and meet our medical director Dr. Rachel Hoffman, and the DDR vet team. Meet actor and DDR supporter Danny Trejo, who will be signing autographs, and taking pictures with you and your family.  Last but not least, some of our adoptable DDR dogs will be mingling at the party.  Consider adopting or fostering a DDR dog so that we can rescue more dogs from over crowded shelters.

Please RSVP to let us know that you will be joining us as we raise funds to increase access to veterinary care for everyone.  If you can’t make it out to the party, consider making a donation to DDR

Donate

See you at the PARTY!

Letter from Lori

Dear Friends and Supporters,

I am writing to you today to share an inspiring story about our work and to ask for your vital support to continue serving our community. For the past several months, DDR’s mobile clinic has become a community focused, vital resource for low-income families and their beloved pets. Operating two to three days a week, our clinic offers essential spay/neuter services, vaccinations, and microchipping. Tuesday and Thursday, our mobile clinic parks behind Clancy’s Closet, and our team performs surgeries for 20-25 cats and dogs.

Allow me to share a special story that exemplifies the impact of our work. Baby, a beautiful two-year-old blue pit bull, had a litter of puppies about four months ago. Her owner, who was recently housed, reached out to us in desperate need of spay/neuter services for Baby, and Lucky, her male dog. Two months ago, we successfully neutered Lucky, but due to a series of unforeseen circumstances, Baby’s spay appointment was repeatedly delayed. Despite these challenges, our team remained patient and committed. Finally, we were able to pick up Baby and her owner, bring them to Clancy’s Closet, and Dr. Hoffman performed the much-needed spay surgery.  This story highlights the compassion and perseverance that define our work and the trust we build with the families we serve.

In addition to our spay/neuter services, our Cat Box Clinic addresses various medical needs for pet cats from low-income families who cannot afford veterinary care. Dr. Hoffman and RVT Claudia treat cats with wounds, ringworm, upper respiratory infections, and various skin, eye, and ear infections. Families contribute what they can, but no one is ever turned away due to inability to pay.

Running these clinics is not inexpensive. We bear the costs of staff salaries, medicines, and supplies, just like any for-profit veterinary clinic. To continue providing these critical services, we urgently need your support. A donation of $100 covers spay/neuter and vaccinations for a cat, while $200 does the same for a dog.

       

Please consider making a donation today to help us continue our mission. Your generosity ensures that we can keep our mobile clinic and Cat Box Clinic running, offering a lifeline to pets and their families who need it most.   DONATE

Thank you for your kindness and support.

With gratitude,

Lori Weise
Executive Director – Founder

Meet our Social Worker

Meet our new social worker, Jackie Parra. Her first day, on site at the South Los Angeles Shelter, was April 9th. Thanks to a generous grant from https://www.californiaforallanimals.com/ DDR is able to employ her full-time, Tuesdays-Saturdays. Jackie has her masters in social work, and lots of experience working with unhoused people. She shares our belief that everyone deserves to be compassionately supported.                                                                                                                                                                                                 

Different than the work that our shelter intervention counselors, Amanda and Yesenia continue to do, Jackie focuses on preventing people from becoming homeless, thanks to our partners on this grant https://www.heartla.org/about-heart  Together, HEART and DDR assist people with pets who might come to the shelter to surrender their cat or dog because they believe that they have no alternatives to avoid an eviction. In addition, Jackie is there to provide increased access to a wide variety of benefits, including EBT and SSI to name a few. Most important, she is there to be that empathetic listener for people in crisis. 

 

Rather than referring people to other agencies to receive case management services, DDR is now able to provide a one-stop-source for all types and human and animal services, with a goal of keeping people housed, and finding a path to permanent housing for those that are unsheltered with their pets.

Check out our April report

Children (0 – 17): 0
Adults (18 – 59): 7
Seniors (60+): 6
Other (unknown): 1
Total Cases: 14
Children (0 – 17) in Households: 0
Adults (18 – 59) in Households: 7
Seniors (60+) in Households: 6
Other (unknown) in Households: 1
Total Households: 14 households with a total of 14 members

We want to share a story of how this innovative program helped one person and her two dogs avoid becoming unsheltered. Sonia (not her real name) had lived for more than two decades in her rented home when it burned down, leaving her nowhere to go with her two dogs. Her landlord was able to place her in a temporary shelter that denied the dogs. While she slept […]

Quality of Life Clinics for Suffering Pets

We believe that it is crucial to reflect on the profound impact humane euthanasia can have on both pets and their devoted families. While the decision to say goodbye is undeniably agonizing, it’s a compassionate act born out of love, mercy, and the unyielding desire to alleviate suffering. So when we bought our mobile veterinary clinic, offering access to humane euthanasia was definitely going to be part of our monthly services that we offer our community.

Wednesday evening was our first Quality of Life Clinic (QLC) for pets who live with unhoused people and low income families, who cannot afford veterinary care, including humane euthanasia.  Access to humane euthanasia is not something that is widely discussed, and we do not receive a grant to fund this work, but we believe that it is an essential service. No family should feel that surrendering a pet to the shelter is their only option because they cannot afford end of life services at an animal hospital. Not every senior pet in dire medical condition was “dumped” by their owner. Many senior, suffering pets end up in shelters as a result of the high costs for humane euthanasia.

10 year old Daz received a Quality of Life exam and Dr. Hoffman was able to prescribe medication for his arthritis, and giving his family hope for improvement.

 

Our QLC runs from 4pm to 8pm, and can see up to eight patients, using our veterinary mobile clinic, and a second recovery room trailer. Our first patient, Aurora had advanced kidney failure, cancer, and was clearly suffering.  When her family tried to surrender her to the Harbor Shelter because they believed that was their only option to end her suffering, a staff member referred them to us, explaining that we would help Aurora.  Even though humane euthanasia was the “right thing to do”, it was very painful for them to make the decision. 

Lucky, an 11 year old Chihuahua / Terrier had been in our program for years. Despite trying several different types of treatments, multiple blood panels, monthly medications, his autoimmune disease was progressing rapidly, and he was clearly in pain.  His quality of life was poor.  Dr. Hoffman spent time with Lucky’s family, listening to all their concerns, and helping them ultimately come to the decision to humanely euthanize Lucky, ending his suffering.

Lucky’s family described him as their child. No words could express how much they loved him

16 year old Harley was blind, deaf, could no longer walk, and had stopped eating earlier in the week.  Her person is a senior citizen in poor health, so a family member brought Harley to our clinic.  Her family had already made up their mind to end her suffering, and Dr. Hoffman reassured them that they were making the kindest choice, and that Harley was in pain. Living on a fixed income, without our QLC, Harley may […]

DDR wants to keep pets with their family – even when they don’t have housing

Watch DDR on ABC!  A reporter came out to Clancy’s Closet to highlight what our thrift store for pets is offering our community.  Then, he went with DDR staff and volunteers to do street outreach, where they passed out pet food and supplies, meeting people with pets where they are, while encouraging unhoused people to register their pets to be spayed and neutered.

Watch here  https://abc7.com/downtown-dog-rescue-pet-care-homeless-los-angeles/14612593/

Pet Support Space 2023 Review

In 2023, we provided services for 6,413 family pets: 4627 dogs and 1784 cats living in South East and South Central Los Angeles, Boyle Heights, Skid Row, and parts of Wilmington.

Humane Euthanasia for terminally ill, suffering, mostly senior dogs. For many of these pets, their families could not afford the cost of humane euthanasia, or they were unaware of what it is.  Without our support, some of these pets would be surrendered to the shelter system not because their family wanted to “dump” their old dog or cat, the families were low income, and could not raise enough money to go to an animal hospital.  We partner with Los Angeles Animal Services (LAAS) staff, who refer cases to DDR, keeping more pets from unnecessarily entering the shelter system.

General Wellness is offered through our free vaccination clinics with the Southern California Veterinary Medicine Association.  Volunteer veterinarians and techs come together once a month, for the past eight years, to vaccinate, microchip, deworm, and provide flea + tick medication for thousands of cats and dogs.

Medical Expenses for more extensive veterinary care such as ear, eye, skin infections, but include medical emergencies such as pets that were hit-by-car, poisoned, of which the majority are referred to our counselors through LASS where we have counselors on site at the South Los Angeles and Harbor Shelters.  Meeting low income families with pets in a time of crisis is the shelter intervention component to our mission of keeping pets and people together, and to eliminate suffering.

Spay/Neuter is still the best solution to preventing suffering. Currently there are more families who want to spay/neuter their pets than there are available and affordable appointments.  

The Food Program collects data on people with pets who receive ongoing monthly food and supply support.  Our food program numbers do not take into account all of the one-time meetings where we offer people with pets food, and other necessary supplies like a leash or a crate.  Working with agencies such as Los Angeles Homeless Service Authority LAHSA outreach workers who often stop by Clancy’s Closet to pick up everything that they need for their clients with pets. Making it a one-stop-shop place to get food, crate, blankets, collar & leash, etc.

The majority of all of our donations go towards funding our Pet Support Space program.  We are always happy to share our data, answer any questions, especially from other non profits interested in doing this type of work.  We could not continue our mission without YOUR support!  THANK YOU!

Clancy’s Closet 2023

About this time last year, we signed a one year lease on a retail storefront located on the Tweedy Mile in South Gate. With a goal of creating a safe space where all community members with pets feel understood and supported, this space became our new location for our Pet Support Space office and Clancy’s Closet, a thrift store for pets, named in honor of Clancy, one of the greatest dogs who ever lived. We accomplished a lot in 2023, and wanted to share some highlights with you!

 

We opened for business in February, with limited store hours, but we’ve expanded our hours to Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 10am to 2:30pm, and Saturday 1:00 to 4:00 because the South Los Angeles community supported us by shopping, and donating to give back to our community. And, of course, there are the volunteers!

There is no way we could receive donations, prepare them for the display, assist customers, decorate the store, and so much more without our dedicated volunteer participants.  These are the volunteers who have been DDR clients with their pets, who were looking for a way to return to work part time, wanted to go back to school, had a goal of getting and maintaining stable permanent housing.  Each participants volunteers a minimum of four hours per week, and in exchange, DDR gives them gift cards to buy groceries, pays monthly school tuition, furthering their personal goals. In addition, DDR staff continues to support each participant through their journey of signing up for online benefits, dealing with various agencies that distribute benefits.  We advocate for them, making sure that they are on the fast track to housing, or if in housing, stay in it, and create a safe place to call home. We enrolled a total of six people, and three have worked for six months or more.

On Saturdays, our outstanding high school students run Clancy’s Closet.  The store is often their first opportunity to learn job skills, such as customer service, making pet ID tags for $1 donation, pricing items, making change + counting the drawer at the end of the day. They stock our “little free library” with books for children.  The students bring so much positive energy as our next generation of animal welfare advocates.

 

During this past year, we met a lot of families, who needed help with finding low cost spay/neuter, especially for cats.  Some of our customers were reluctant to get their pets spayed or neutered, but with lots of great information that included having a conversation about the benefits for the pet, their family, and the community, changed some people’s opinions on […]

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