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COMMUNITY ANIMAL CARE [CAC]

Community Animal CARE [CAC] is an innovative Public Health centered program designed to prevent and solve persistent
Human and Animal related challenges. CAC will deliver critical resources to community members led by Proximate Leaders.
In particular, Access to Care and Prevention, Pet Behavioral Training, Pet Resources, Compliance Awareness, Lost and Found Pets,
and Involuntary Surrender Prevention.

Our Method For Change

Over Policing, Fining, and Citing communities does not solve resource challenges. Providing communities with the essential tools and resources they need keeps pets out of shelters and with the families they love.

CAC focuses heavily on keeping pets at home. To that end, the division’s In-Reach Team ensures communities of focus are aware of local ordinances to thwart seizures and fines, connected with local and online pet behaviorists, and supplied with disaster relief guides and resources.

Something to keep in mind:

The lack of veterinarians in the U.S. keeps demand for their services high, well out of reach for those who need them most. More than 135 Million Dogs and Cats live with people throughout the U.S. Still, less than 60 Thousand small animal veterinarians exist, equaling 1 veterinarian per every 2,200 pets. That equation does not account for pet birds, reptiles, and other companion pets. Even in the best scenario where veterinary care was more affordable, pets would continue to suffer, particularly those living within marginalized BIPOC communities, due to veterinarian shortages.

More about CAC

The communities we love and partner with are dramatically and willfully underserved, compelling CARE to create a comprehensive safety net, Community Animal Care [CAC]. CARE Center Proximate Leaders regularly do fantastic work for their communities. But, because they live in underserved communities, they often face insurmountable odds. CAC provides an opportunity for Proximate Leaders and communities to have a Human and Animal Well-Being support system capable of saving municipal dollars and relieving suffering for both people and animals.

Aside from physical wellness, CAC will focus heavily on keeping pets at home.
To that end, the division’s In-Reach Team will ensure communities of focus are aware of local ordinances to thwart seizures and fines, connected with local and online pet behaviorists, and supplied with disaster relief guides and resources. The In-Reach team will promote and support community-based fostering programs, adoption events, and re-homing.

 

Direct CARE Fund

  • Bring awareness to Direct CARE Funding
  • Local Fundraisers for Direct CARE
  • Partner with local Vets and Vet Techs to deliver
    Preventive Care and, when possible, affordable vet care.

Access to Preventive CARE & Emergent CARE
Using our Pet Census data, CARE’s In-Reach
and the veterinary team will provide the following
Preventive CARE resources:

  • Accessible Community-centered events
  • Accessible Resources & Materials
  • Free Online video resources
  • National Social Media Community for FAQ Pet Questions

Environmental Justice & Policy
Black, Indigenous, and People of Color [BIPOC] and their pets
are on the front-lines of Global Climate Change, Air Pollution,
and Rising Sea Levels. Millions are paying a price for policies
they have little control over. To that end, CARE is deploying
Environmental Justice and Policy strategies to support our
communities of focus.

In partnership with Proximate Leaders, the team will review and
analyze local ordinances, statutes, regulations, and policies that
could harm or benefit the community residents. When possible,
grassroots techniques will be used to encourage self-advocacy.

Emergency Response [Volunteer-Based]

  • Volunteers connect with local pet parents and Proximate
    Leaders using Community Pet Census Data.
  • Volunteers collect and manage emergency supplies in
    partnership with other local resource centers in Partnership
    with Proximate Leaders.
  • In partnership with local, state, regional, and national
    Emergency Response teams [Police/Fire/Community Service
    Agencies/Proximate Leaders], volunteers stay abreast
    of pending weather emergencies
  • Using a CAC App [to be designed], Emergency Response
    volunteers can send EMTs, FEMA, or others to specific
    addresses with permission from pet parents.
  • Ahead of any natural disaster, volunteers will
    deliver emergency supplies.

 

Fostering Assistance Network [FAN]

Foster Assistance Network (FAN) is an incentive foster program to lower the burden on foster families. FAN has the potential to provide much-needed relief to shelters and provide advice to fosters and pet parents, including behavioral training resources, affordable supplies, and low-cost veterinary partnerships

The network would assist in local re-homing and promoting adoption, fostering, and temporary fostering for people facing emergent housing challenges for their pets (domestic violence, natural disasters, etc.)

IN-Reach

  • Community Needs Assessment
  • Pet Census
  • Community Liaison
  • Resource Distribution and Guidance
  • Community Pet Advocacy
  • Compliance Awareness
  • Partner with resource centers to store
    food and pet medical supplies
  • Community-centered dog training: (including prison
    programs) Partner with local pet behavior experts to
    deliver low-cost free training advice to community
    members, such as tips on preventing dog bites and
    dog-on-dog attacks, free training resources via video
    demonstration

Community Compliance Program

  • Using In-Reach and Pet census data, make all
    efforts to become a trusted Partner with pet parents
  • Inform pet parents of local ordinances
    and assist with compliance
  • Work to remove out-of-date and unnecessarily punitive
    code provisions that disproportionately harm BIPOC
    communities and their pets

Identify Proximate Leaders
Engage and encourage potential CARE Center Leaders
If applicable, mentor/support proximate leaders

Event Hosting and Coordination
Host or Co-Host quarterly events with other community
partners. Attend and, if applicable, sponsor community events

Ed Jamison

Ed Jamison, Chair of the CAC Advisory Board 
Miguel Ruelas

Miguel Ruelas, Director, Community Animal Care (CAC)
Michelle George

Michelle George, Director, Community Animal CARE (CAC)

Mikki Arnold, CARE Center and Community Animal Care Coordinator
Sharon and dog Legend

Sharon Nordrum, InReach Coordinator, Community Animal CARE [CAC]
Ed Jamison

Ed Jamison, Chair of the CAC Advisory Board 

Ed Jamison serves as CEO of Operation Kindness, a lifesaving non-profit animal welfare organization based in Texas. Under his leadership since March 2021, Ed guides the organization to administer innovative programs impacting dogs and cats across the region, including community initiatives, shelter partnerships, interstate transport, forensics for animal cruelty and more. Ed also leads the lifesaving work at the Operation Kindness shelter, which includes a medical wing, neonatal kitten nursery and pet food pantry, located in Carrollton, TX.

Previously, Ed served as the Director of Dallas Animal Services (DAS). When he joined DAS in 2017, the animal situation in Dallas was the center of public scrutiny. Ed was tasked with increasing public safety by getting loose animals off the streets, while also increasing positive outcomes. The “Dallas 90” campaign was designed to help create a community where all people and animals are safe, treated with respect, and have access to the resources needed to thrive. With a dog and cat intake of over 39,000 in 2019, Dallas had the 3rd highest intake in the nation. 

With an extensive background working in the animal welfare field beginning in the early 2000s, Ed worked in Cleveland, Ohio, before moving to the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. In the position of Chief Animal Control Officer for the City of Cleveland, Jamison pushed to redefine functionality and public perception of animal control. The award-winning, trademarked CITY DOGs Cleveland Adoption and Volunteer programs continue to be flourishing programs copied throughout the country. 

Ed is currently the President of Texas Unites for Animals, Vice President of the National Animal Care & Control Association, and Board Member for the Association of Animal Welfare Advancement and Shelter Animals Count. His main role as the Chair of the CAC Advisory Board will be to support the CAC department at CARE by providing insights from the Human and Animal well-being field to create and sustain the effectiveness of the CAC program across the country. He will be responsible for building the rest of the CAC Advisory Board and ensure a focus on community driven and led workforce is considered throughout the council’s discussions to ensure sustainability.

Miguel Ruelas

Miguel Ruelas, Director, Community Animal Care (CAC)

Miguel Ruelas (he/they) is a parent to one human and three non-human creatures. Born and raised on unceded Tongva land in so-called Los Angeles, they are a queer, Trans, working class, child of Mexican immigrants and bring a wealth of expertise stemming from a lifetime of navigating the intersections of these identities. He works to build connections and uplift communities who have been historically marginalized and systematically oppressed. 

Miguel has had a passion for animals his entire life and spent the last 7 years in animal well being developing programming and working directly in and with communities. He is a certified community counselor and mediator and is excited to bring their whole self to his position as Director of Community Animal Care and continue supporting the human-animal bond through partnerships with the communities CARE serves and the other organizations and agencies uplifting those communities.

Email:miguel@careawo.org

Michelle George

Michelle George, Director, Community Animal CARE (CAC)

Michelle has over 10 years of working experience in an open-intake county animal shelter with services contracted for shelter operations as well as field enforcement operations. While working in most departments within the shelter, the majority of her work experience was gained within Field Services. In the pursuit of the next opportunity or new challenge, she has been able to learn many facets (kennel, adoptions, client care, dispatch, field support, rescue through transport, and more) within animal welfare, never shying from the chance to be a source of information to anyone she meets. Awareness and empowerment are key.  

When away from work, Michelle enjoys spending time with her family, pets, and friends, traveling, and shopping.   

Email:Michelle@careawo.org

Mikki Arnold, CARE Center and Community Animal Care Coordinator

Mikki was born and raised in Villa Rica, Georgia. She’s the proud mom of twin 16-year old boys. She attended Massey College and spent her career working at municipal animal services organizations, but she’s super happy to start at CARE where, as she described…

I won’t have to keep telling people why they can’t keep their pets.
At CARE I get to help figure out how they CAN keep them.

Email:mikki@careawo.org

Sharon and dog Legend

Sharon Nordrum, InReach Coordinator, Community Animal CARE [CAC]

Hello, my name is Sharon Nordrum. I live in Laporte, MN with my adult son Andreas and several dogs and 2 cats. My whole life has revolved around the care and wellbeing of animals. My mom was the first animal rescuer in my hometown.

At any one time we would have 3 or 4 dogs in our home looking for their forever homes. I really started helping with this endeavor when I was 12 years old and have never looked back. My first job was a kennel worker at one of our veterinarian clinics. At 15 I was working at both clinics with the money going towards the care of all the foster dogs and cats that came through our door.

When we moved to our current location, we thought that we would be stepping away from rescue work as there are local shelters around us. Oh, how wrong we were! We had only been in our new home for 2 weeks before the first rescue came through the door. He ended up being a foster failure and my son’s best friend. Loner was with us for almost 7 years. We believed he was around 13 years old when he passed away. Loner was just the first of many that have graced our home.

In 2011 I bought my first purebred dog BaWaaJige (2011-2022) and the two of us entered into the world of dog shows/sports. I compete in dock jumping, agility, rally, scent work, hunting and fast cat. I am an AKC CGC (Canine Good Citizen), trick dog, farm dog, fetch dog evaluator. I am also a UKC evaluator for SPOT (Socialized Pet Obedience Test). I am working on becoming a Fit Dog evaluator and a Scent Work judge for UKC. Dogs are not my whole life. I am also an artist. My artistic style is a combination of Woodland Indian/Saami floral and fauna.

I have been commissioned to paint several murals in our local schools. My art has been used in books and for company signs. I also sit on 3 local organization boards. MAHUBE -OTWA, Regional Sustainable Development Partnership and Coalition to Re-Authorize MN Lottery Funds. My life is busy, but full. I can’t wait to dive into working for/with CARE.

Email:sharon@careawo.org

COMMUNITY ANIMAL CARE STAFF
& ADVISORY BOARD

Community Animal CARE [CAC] is an innovative Public Health centered program designed to prevent and solve persistent Human and Animal related challenges. CAC programming only works when community trust is present. Our staff and the members of CAC’s advisory board have been doing the work to keep people and pets together for decades, and it shows.

SPECIAL THANKS TO OUR GIVERS CIRCLE

COLLABORATORS

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