SAFE Haven for Cats

The life-saving sheltering and adoption of 1,323 Cats was our largest program this year. In the last 29 years, we have adopted over 15,400 Cats. We assist people in our community through family oriented, thoughtful adoption programs and many educational services. We provide medical care, vaccines, testing and sterilization to these 1,323 Cats preventing the births of hundreds of Cats in our community for which there are no homes. We worked with our largest euthanizing shelters to reduce the euthanasia rates in our community by taking 328 Cats from them this year, and through cooperative programs and tnvr (trap/ neuter/vaccinate/release) programs for community Cats. As the community's oldest no-kill shelter, we save all the adoptable, treatable and recoverable Cats and kittens. We continue to rescue Cats from hoarders, research labs and abusive situations. We maintain 65 foster homes for special Cats such as orphans, or those with medical or behavioral issues that can be resolved.we are an almost all volunteer organization with 125 volunteers per week in 12 shifts. They donate approximately $442,494 of services annually. In this calendar year, 14,834 members of the public received support and information relating to stray, abandoned, injured, orphaned or community Cats.

Safe Haven for Cats fed 735 dogs and Cats in the community and distributed 16 tons of food to needy pet lovers. The goal of this program is to assist pet owners when times are tough so they do not have to abandon or give up their pets. Additionally, through screening, we are able to identify animals who need our free spay/neuter services.as the effects of covid waned, Safe Haven for Cats held more in person educational events this year. We also participated in many citywide festivals and many animal themed events. On top of that, we have a website that is visited by thousands of people per year. We publish 2 print newsletters and 10 on-line e-newsletters yearly. Our education is focused on several areas: (1) reducing euthanasia through sterilization, (2) teaching and enabling ordinary citizens to "rescue" stray or community Cats to prevent injury or death, (3) promoting animal shelters as fun, clean, excellent places to adopt pets as an alternative to breeders and mills, (4) teaching citizens how to implement tnvr programs in their neighborhoods to improve the lives of community Cats, (5) assisting our neighbors to find good homes for stray Cats they have found, (6) teaching about the benefits of animal ownership and promoting the animal/human bond, (7) promoting responsible pet ownership, (8) keeping people from abandoning or relinquishing their pets by helping them solve behavioral problems, (9) reuniting owners with lost pets, and (10) providing volunteer/enrichment opportunities for youth, seniors, persons with disabilities, and civic/corporate groups.

The Safe care spay and neuter clinic was the first permanent low cost clinic just for Cats in north carolina and only one of three clinics in a region of over one million residents. We served clients from 35 north carolina counties this year. We sterilized 7,285 Cats and kittens through the clinic, 2,955 who were feral Cats. As a service to our community and to reduce the births of unwanted Cats and kittens, we offer our services monday through friday each week. We will help anybody who has a need. We accept pets, strays, and feral Cats into our clinic. Of the 7,285 seen this year, we have provided 31% of these Cats with greatly reduced fees ranging from $0-$50. (regular price is $75/$85.) Why? So no cat or person in need is ever turned away from the clinic. 74% of the Cats coming through our clinic have never been to a veterinarian before. Through education we are teaching people about tnvr to help reduce the number of community Cats in our city. Uncontrolled cat population is the number one reason for euthanasia in our state. Over 53,000 have been sterilized in the clinic to date.