We're off to a great start!!

Planned PEThood has completed our first month of business. The results have been amazing, and have far surpassed our expectations. Notably,

• We averaged 20 surgeries per day during our 4^th week, putting us ahead of schedule in our plan to reach 35 per day by our 2^nd quarter of operation.
• Also during our 4^th week of operation, we saw a day when our feral shelves were completely full, holding 18 feral cats.
• We saw our first adoption between clients in our lobby, when a kitten who was trapped in a feral trap was adopted by a nice lady whose cat needed a friend.

We’re so thankful for the support we’ve received from the community! People have been extremely generous, bringing in supplies and goodies, and filling up our donation jar. Several have also been generous with their time, and we’d like to give them special mention:

• The wonderful ladies who dedicate at least one day every week to help us out – we could never do it without them!
• Nancy
• Kathe
• Phyllis
• Vicki
• Nick, who comes every Thursday afternoon to clean the clinic to within an inch of its life!
• All the rest of our volunteers who fill in whenever they have a few hours during the week or on Saturday for a vaccine clinic::
• Tiffany
• Heather
• Cheri
• Lindy
• Dave

We’d also like to thank:

• All of our amazing facebook fans who support us with “likes” and comments and bring us supplies when we need them! Thanks for everything you have brought us including the newspaper, grocery bags, paper towels AND BROWNIES!!! You’re the best!!
• All of the feral trappers out there. You work tirelessly to take care of those cats and brought us 14 last Monday when it had been raining all day Sunday and was still raining on Monday morning. Amazing! It is so wonderful to hear you all chatting about your colonies and offering advice to each other in our lobby.
• All of our customers who have been so grateful for our service. Thank you for bringing us your beautiful babies! Many of you even rounded up your payments to help our neediest clients.

Thanks to EVERYONE for making our first month so rewarding. It makes our hard work that much more worth it. We know that we have a long way to go but we are determined that we will help make Gwinnett Georgia’s first No-Kill county!!

It's Crunch Time!!

You haven’t heard from us at Planned PEThood for a few weeks. We’ve been remiss in keeping up with our blog and progress reports. But we haven’t gone away, just hunkered down – and now we’re in the final run-up to opening Atlanta’s newest spay/neuter clinic!

We’re currently negotiating a lease, and hope to have it signed by early May so we can begin buildout for a grand opening this summer. We’ve decided to remain in the area we know best, which is Duluth.

Now we need your help more than ever!

If 20 people will donate $1,000 each, we can open the doors knowing that our operating expenses will be covered for the 1st three months while we ramp up our average daily surgeries. Donors at this level will be recognized with special signage in our new lobby! Of course, we understand that not everyone has that amount available, and we’re grateful for every contribution.

Here’s how your donation can help:
 $100 Two boxes of suture
 $250 One “spay pack” of surgical instruments
 $500 One month’s supply of rabies vaccines
 $1000 One month’s rent
 $2000 Pay for our building's signage

Together, we can significantly decrease the number of unwanted animals born each year in Georgia, and reduce the suffering and euthanasia of healthy, adoptable dogs and cats at our local shelters.
It’s easy to donate – you can use Paypal, or mail a check – just contact us for a mailing address.

I hope you’re as excited as we are to be this close to providing a real solution to pet overpopulation in our area!

p.s. We have received IRS approval of our 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status. Your donation is tax-deductible!

One Score you Want to be Below Average

If you’re a Georgia resident, you’ve probably heard of Rockdale County. It’s located on the East side of metro Atlanta, with I-20 running right through its middle. Conyers is its county seat, and it boasts lots of outdoor recreational areas, as well as the Georgia International Horse Park, site of the 1996 Olympic Equestrian events. It also has an Animal Control facility that kills 54% of the animals that come through its doors. That’s right, out of every 100 lost puppies or stray cats, you can pick 54 of them that won’t leave the shelter alive.

Are you shocked? Horrified at this statistic? Angry with the Rockdale officials who kill all these innocent creatures? Don’t be. 54% is the AVERAGE percentage among all Animal Control shelters in the 28 counties that make up “Metro Atlanta.” It could be worse. Those animals could end up in Lamar County, which put down an astonishing 97% in 2007. The LUCKIEST animals in our metro area are in Heard County, where only 14% don’t make it out.

These numbers, from 2007, are found in a newly published report by the Georgia Voters for Animal Welfare (GVAW), a small group of volunteers who took it upon themselves to compile these statistics for every Georgia county. The state doesn’t keep track, so it’s up to every county to keep their own numbers and disclose them – or not. Four of the 28 metro counties would just rather not say how many dogs and cats are surrendered or picked up, or euthanized.

Now, I’m not going to get on a rant about our government not making this information public, or even lament the untold millions of tax dollars that keep these shelters in operation. What bothers me the most is that it’s considered “necessary” by anyone, anywhere, to kill dogs and cats in order to control their population. It is NOT necessary. What’s necessary is for people to wake up and understand that we are ALL contributing to this tragedy, and the solution is simple: SPAY OR NEUTER YOUR PET. Heck, don’t stop there, spay or neuter someone else’s pet. Trap that stray cat that’s been hanging around your office and get him neutered. Talk to that person down the street whose “mama dog” keeps getting out of the fence. Educate acquaintances who are considering buying a new puppy about rescue options, and the horrors of puppy mills. Show your purebred-loving friends pictures of your wonderful mixed-breed cat. DO SOMETHING to stop this senseless pattern of killing.

If you’re a Rockdale County resident or official reading this, I’m sorry I picked on you. You just happened to land in the middle of the numbers. Now, get out there and move your county to the bottom of the next list. This is one score that you should really want to be “below average.”

(Here is a link to the complete report by GVAW, which gives the results of their polling of 159 county shelters and 88 other local/city shelters. The reference to 28 counties in the blog above refers to the area designated as “metro Atlanta” by the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce.)