HENDERSONVILLE, NC (FEBRUARY 2, 2008) – Today United Animal Nations (UAN) is deploying trained volunteers from across the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic to help the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (NCDA&CS) care for 155 dogs and 25 cats at a shelter that is closing because it is not in compliance with the state’s Animal Welfare Act.
Volunteers with UAN’s Emergency Animal Rescue Service (EARS) will join the NCDA&CS staff and representatives from other local and national animal protection organizations to care for these animals while arrangements are made to transfer them to other facilities where they can be made available for adoption.
“Our EARS volunteers are trained in emergency sheltering, and they can provide the kind of one-on-one care and attention that these animals will need to have a better chance at a brighter future,” said UAN President and CEO Nicole Forsyth. “We are pleased to be able to contribute our expertise in emergency sheltering and crisis relief to the State of North Carolina and the animals now in their care.”
  EARS Ohio State Coordinator Bonnie Morrison comforts one resident of the North Carolina shelter.  |
EARS volunteers will provide shelter management, routine animal care, and general upkeep and cleaning. Many of the EARS volunteers have significant experience operating emergency shelters and working with dogs that have lacked socialization and consistent human contact. Some volunteers have traveled from as far away as Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania to assist, and more than a dozen more are on standby to deploy to North Carolina if needed.
“We EARS volunteers are not just ready, but eager, to respond when animals need us,” said EARS North Central Regional Director Diann Wellman, of Hartford City, Indiana. “This is not glamorous work, but it’s extremely rewarding.” Welllman led an EARS volunteer sheltering team for three weeks after a tornado destroyed the town of Greensburg, Kansas in May 2007.
View our blog for more details on this situation.
With more than 3,500 trained volunteers in the United States and Canada, UAN can deploy its Emergency Animal Rescue Service when communities become overburdened by a crisis involving large numbers of animals. In its 20-year history, UAN has responded to more than 70 natural disasters and other crises in the United States, including Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, Hurricane Isabel in 2003, and Hurricanes Hurricane Dennis and Floyd in 1999.
Founded in 1987, United Animal Nations (UAN) is the nation’s leading provider of emergency animal sheltering and disaster relief services and a key advocate for the critical needs of animals.
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