Hear from Shelter Operations Manager Kiersten Thoma as she reflects on the incredible impact of our community adoption events like Puppy Palooza and All Ages Adoption. From long-stay shelter pets finally finding their forever families to shy pups blossoming with love and care, these events are changing lives, both for the animals and the people who welcome them home. Kiersten shares the behind-the-scenes moments and the powerful outcomes that your monthly support helps make possible.!
“Since starting with HPA!, I have become more and more exposed to the different shelters in the Houston area- their needs, their struggles, their pitfalls. I’ve met their staff, I’ve loved on their animals, and I’ve worked to try to find solutions to help alleviate the jam-packed kennels you’ll find just about everywhere.
It came to me after Montgomery County Animal Services sent out a list of puppies that were in need at their shelter. How could there possibly be puppies that were in need of rescue? Surely adopters were lining up for them.
But they weren’t.
Shelters are intimidating, with hundreds of animals staring out at you from behind bars, begging and pleading with you with their eyes and soft cries, “Please don’t go.” It was only recently that I found out the statistic that drives the stigma of shelters home and that’s that only 65% of the animals brought into homes in America come from municipal shelters.
And so Puppy Palooza was born. Shelters from all over Houston selected 10 puppies each to send to HPA!, where volunteers geared up to talk all about their new four-legged friends that were there to find their furever homes. It was a warmer setting, with music, vendors, and even snow cones. Puppy Palooza gave an outlet to the overcrowded shelters that were faced with making impossible decisions day after day. We watched, stunned, as a line of potential adopters formed down the stairs and into the parking lot, just waiting for the doors to open. What we experienced over the next four hours was beyond our wildest dreams for both HPA! and for the shelters that found an ally with us on that Saturday in April.
Gail and I looked at each other as the last puppy from Montgomery County left the building, grins on our faces. “Why stop here?” we said. So we didn’t! The Second Chance Showcase (now known as the All-Ages Adoption Event) came to fruition. Shelters were encouraged to send five of their neediest, more overlooked, longest-stay dogs of any age, color, or size to HPA! for the exposure they weren’t getting in the shelters.
That’s when I met Max. I don’t know what it was about him, but I fell in love immediately. He was a large yellow lab mix with deep, soulful eyes. He was very unassuming, quiet in his kennel, and getting almost no attention as potential adopters would pass by. I read Max’s story- he was one of 85 dogs seized in a hoarding case. Eighty-two of his “siblings” had found homes, and he was one of the last three left waiting. For two full years. After being pulled from deplorable conditions, the shelter was the only home this poor dog had ever known.
Max was our longest-stay resident at that event, and despite all the efforts of our skillful adoption counselors, he didn’t find a home that day. When the animal control trucks from the different shelters started lining up to collect the dogs that weren’t adopted, we couldn’t let Max go. Max was brought into the HPA! program, where his story was told on a larger platform. Where a foster could see how special he was and take him home. Where he was introduced to his first dog bed that he tucked himself into at night. Where Max wasn’t just a face among hundreds of animals begging and pleading to no longer be a statistic, but instead a lifelong friend.
Thanks to our amazing Adoption Coordinator, Max’s adoption was finalized one month later- on the morning of our fourth Puppy Palooza. The animal control trucks lined up to drop off puppies from as far as Baytown in hopes that they wouldn’t have to return to the shelter. We did 45 adoptions that morning. Max was number 46. And that’s a statistic I’m proud of.”
Every adoption, every foster, and every volunteer moment makes a life-changing difference for the pets we serve. Thank you for being part of our mission and helping turn heartbreaking stories into happy endings!
