Lynchburg Humane Society Blog

As an organization we view ourselves as a for purpose organization or business.    We are always    striving to find ways of improving our business model and continuously look to other industries to benchmark I recently read “The Google Way” and a few articles on the Amazon and Zappos business models regarding managing a team and setting up a successful business structure.   As we transition to the next phase for our organization in our new Center for Pets, we felt that it was important to begin structuring ourselves more like a business, while still maintaining our mission . Thus, our journey to set up the Lynchburg Humane Society as a purpose driven organization began. With all of this in mind, we decided our first step was to create core values for the organization. The new core values, as with any business, will guide us in our day to day operations and in our staffing decisions to better serve the community and the pets in our care. We wou...

Recently, a small group of us brainstormed about our “slogan” or catch phrase for the organization.  Our old catch phrase was “Giving animals a second chance” which was a great statement for our push to become no kill.  But now that the new facility is opening and we have achieved that goal we needed something else.   We considered using our Capital Campaign slogan of “It’s about the pets” but honestly, so much of what we do relates to people and helping them that it isn’t just about the pets.  That is when one member of the committee said “Find Happiness”.  And we all stopped and said, 2014 was an exciting year for us.  We helped 2,359 pets at our old facility.  Of those, 1,741 were adopted and 276 were returned back to their owners so we helped over 2,000 pets find happiness.  This equates to a 94% save rate, the highest since we started down this path to No Kill. Our mission is to continue to save more pets in our community and the su...

Winnie Pearl, adopted at age 12, this summer It is almost the end of 2014 and wow what a year it has been for the pets in our area!   And I can tell you that 2015 will be even more amazing when our new building, Center for Pets, opens up and we have started some of our cool new programs.    I received a note recently from a wonderful supporter and he said, “…we owe you a debt of gratitude for helping to assure an atmosphere in our area where pets have the status of family members”.   Of course, this meant a lot to me but what I would say is that the people in this community are the real heroes in assuring that pets are cared for regardless if they are in a home or not.   YOU. You made it possible for…: over 1,700 pets to find new homes this year   41% more of our tiny kittens to be saved by fostering and becoming Kitten Warriors to reach 40,000 animals   being fixed at our spay/neuter clinic since we opened in 2006 over 6...

One of our amazing Kitten Warriors Back in April, I put out a plea asking for help and communicated with our supporters about the terrible situation we were dealing with in regards to kitten deaths.  In our blog I wrote:  Kittens are dying at an alarming rate.  We have one more spring/summer in the terrible environment of this old shelter and this year we are going to be diligent about getting kittens out of this environment.  We are calling all homes with an extra bathroom, basement, guest room, laundry room; any place a kitten or a litter can live until they are vaccinated and ready to get adopted.   Last year 134 kittens lost their lives in our shelter because of the poor condition of this building.  We are done with this. When people drop off stray kittens, they think they are better off here when they just aren’t.  Rusted surfaces, poor air handling and crowded conditions, coupled with poor immune systems = dying kittens We are not an...

Dear Supporter, A small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead We are so grateful for your participation in, and support of, our amazing transformation over the last five years.   We made sweeping changes that affected many in this community, but no one more than the animals we served.   We have gone from only 49% to a 94% save rate while simultaneously affecting radical change in how we handle and view animals without owners.   Over 1,500 animals looked to us for food, shelter, and medical care last year. This summer is an ongoing part of that sweeping change that we expect from ourselves and the community at large.   “ The Summer of 1,000 Lives” campaign taught us so much about how much we need this community and our supporters, and how we might plan for operating in our new building.   The Lynchburg Humane Society has adopted out 743 animals and brought in more th...