New Sonoma facility enables Pets Lifeline to expand services

At first, the woman was cautious, questioning whether her cat, which had been missing for more than two years, actually was spotted by a friend on a social media site for found animals.

But then she came to Pets Lifeline, Sonoma’s nonprofit animal shelter for dogs and cats, to see for herself.

“I was there when the owner saw her cat and vice versa,” said Nancy King, CEO of the organization. “It was incredible! The woman was floored. She cried and you could tell that the cat recognized her. It was a very touching scene.”

Pets Lifeline facilitated the connection by posting the cat’s photo on all available media sites.

“This is the fabulous part of what we do,” King said.

During the past year, 104 animals have been returned to their owners by Pets Lifeline, but that is only one of the many services provided by the organization, which has vastly expanded its capacity since it opened a new, larger facility at its original location at 19686 Eighth St. E. on March 10, 2021.

“The new facility is fantastic!” King said. “Although we are still working out the intricacies of a new building, we now have improved animal habitats and have a big state-of-the-art veterinary clinic. We increased our capacity by focusing on what we could do well.”

Pets Lifeline began its capital fundraising for the new, $3.4 million building in fall 2017 and broke ground in September 2019. It was designed by architect Henry Wix, with construction managed by contractor Scott Miller.

King says that the new building enables Pets Lifeline to expand its identity.

“It allows us to become more than just a shelter — we’re an animal resource center for both animals and people,” King said. “We do not have an animal control department, which answers calls to pick up strays, but other than that, we do all the same work as shelters, with municipal contracts and so much more.”

The capacity at the new facility is 20 dogs and 75 cats. The dogs have indoor/outdoor kennels, whereas in the old building the dogs had to be moved from inside to outside to be cleaned. The new building has nine cat habitats, with three larger-sized rooms that can hold eight to 12 cats and kittens as well as smaller rooms that can hold one or two cats. The former facility had just one adult cat room and one kitten room.

“This allows us to give the cats more space to find their comfort zone,” King said.

The veterinary clinic has a large surgery room that affords the opportunity to perform spaying and neutering on all the shelter’s animals and offers more options for those services. The previous building had only a small, converted veterinarian/surgery trailer.

King says the new building better enables the staff to keep the animal habitats clean and disinfected, which is key to animal health and well-being.

Pets Lifeline, which is funded entirely through donations, also has been adding staff members, thereby increasing its ability to care for more animals. They include a canine behaviorist, a shelter manager who is a Registered Veterinary Technician, an experienced customer service employee and other staff with veterinary experience.

“This enhances our existing team, which includes very experienced animal care and administrative personnel,” King said.

The increased capacity provided by the facility has enabled it to bring in dogs and cats from local partner shelters that lack space. The organization has also increased its dog training classes; provided more frequent spaying and neutering clinics; increased the Tender Loving Paws program, which assists seniors with veterinary costs to help them keep pets in their homes; and expanded its Pet Food Pantry program, which provides free dog and cat food to those in need.

Previously, dog training classes could only be held outside in agreeable weather conditions. Now, classes can be offered all year long. Summer camps for children ages 4 to 7 and 8 to 12 were held outside in the morning, but now can be offered in the morning and afternoon inside a temperature-controlled room.

“With the COVID environment changing, we also are looking to increase our on-site programs on an ongoing basis,” King said. “We have family-friendly events such as pumpkin carving, egg hunts and Santa Paws [in which photos can be taken with Santa] that bring the community into the shelter. The possibilities are endless!”

Pets Lifeline also is developing a comprehensive Strategic Plan for the next three to five years.

“We genuinely want to become Sonoma Valley’s animal resource center, creating resources for people to keep their pets in the home and unite people and animals,” King said. “We want to teach children compassion for all living things and make sure no animal goes hungry. We want to provide low-cost pet health care and opportunities to bring communities together.”

A current, ongoing plan is to develop emergency preparedness in the event of a disaster. The shelter partners with Sonoma CART (Community Animal Response Team) for training, networking and certification. A shelter evacuation drill already has been created and a shelter-in-place drill will be next.

The shelter aims to soon be certified as a Co-Located Shelter (in which the family and pets are either in the same building, different rooms, adjacent buildings or nearby facilities) as well as have mobile sheltering available should the need arise. Staff members participate in ongoing training to quality as Disaster Service Workers so that they can serve as first responders.

All these additional features are particularly important to Sonoma Valley residents. Pets Lifeline is the only shelter in the Valley, and if it didn’t exist to provide its array of services, stray animals would need to be taken to places such as Santa Rosa, Marin County or Napa County.

Since June 1, 2021, 613 animals — 175 dogs and 438 cats — have arrived at the shelter. During that time, 564 animals have left: 83 dogs were adopted, 83 were returned to their owner and two were transferred; 276 cats were adopted, 117 were returned to their owners and three were transferred.

Beginning in 1982, Pets Lifeline has provided 20,241 animals with shelter, care and protection; found “forever” homes for 12,590 cats and dogs; and returned 7,449 lost and frightened pets to their families.

The shelter collaborates with other local animal shelters to best serve the needs of animals and the community in general. With its additional space and services, Pets Lifeline can mainly focus on bringing in cats and dogs; in the past year, it has transferred only five animals. Sonoma County Animal Services and Lake County Animal Services, both open-admission shelters, are most in need of housing dogs, King said.

“We regularly visit them and take in dogs and cats from them,” she added. “It is an exciting day when we fill our van with animals from our partner shelters. We work also with Muttville [based in San Francisco], which is an amazing organization that is dedicated to senior dogs, and a variety of other partners, like Forgotten Felines, British Columbia Chihuahua rescue.”

Last year, more than 65 of the 482 lost and abandoned dogs that the shelter took in came from other shelters. The shelter’s ability to accommodate other animals depends on the conditions of the animals who are already there and how much space is available.

Pets Lifeline qualifies as a “no-kill” shelter, since its live release rate during the past five years is 97.8%, above the required 90%. A no-kill shelter also is defined as one that does not euthanize healthy or treatable animals even when the shelter is full, reserving euthanasia for terminally ill animals or those considered dangerous to public safety. Pets Lifeline also meets this requirement.

“But the animal welfare sector as a whole is moving away from the kill versus no kill terminology,” King said. “As an organization, our board and staff agree with this wholeheartedly and choose to focus on programs that reduce the supply of animals such as spay/neuter and Human Education, and instead focus on how many lives we can save.”

She says that regardless of whether they’re kill or no-kill, all shelters euthanize in cases where animals are a danger to the community or experiencing intense suffering.

Pets Lifeline is also celebrating its 40th anniversary. It’s roots date to 1982, when Helen Clary and a handful of other dedicated animal lovers, concerned that there were no local animal shelters or resources to help address the problem of stray and abandoned animals, decided to create a local animal welfare organization out of her home.

“Originally, the animal population was much more of a free-ranging nature, and Helen and company would return stray dogs to owners or find homes if no owners came forward,” King said. “She also spearheaded the spay/neuter movement back in the day to reduce the population of unwanted cats and dogs.”

The shelter relocated when the property on Eighth Street was donated, and construction of the original shelter was completed in 1987. Its mission is to protect and improve the lives of cats and dogs in need in Sonoma Valley through sheltering and adoption, humane education and community programs.

“Through the years, the mission has been updated to include the services we provide, with the result of bringing people and animals together,” King said. “Pets Lifeline has been successful in achieving its mission because we put the animals first. The organization has evolved into an outstanding community resource.

“Animal welfare, as we know it, reflects our ever-changing community. In a perfect world, we would work ourselves out of a job and not have lost and abandoned cats and dogs. To that end, we have great programs now to help keep animals in the home instead of coming into a shelter.”

Reach the reporter, Dan Johnson, at daniel.johnson@sonomanews.com.