This year, Maddie’s Fund celebrates 25 years of helping homeless pets and advancing the animal welfare sector. By partnering with shelters, rescues, and other animal welfare organizations all over the country, they have helped advance the sector as a whole and increase lifesaving. We’re so grateful to be a Maddie’s Fund partner, and to work closely with them to save more animals locally, regionally, and nationally. So in honor of Maddie’s Fund’s 25th anniversary, we’re celebrating their legacy with 25 ways Maddie’s Fund has helped Humane Society Silicon Valley.

1. In 2011, Maddie’s Fund gave our community’s animal shelter coalition (WeCARE) the Maddie’s Lifesaving Award for achieving a high save rate. This award recognized not only our ability to save more animals than ever before, but also recognized the achievement of our goal of saving every single healthy animal in the County of Santa Clara.
2. In 2008 and 2009, they gave HSSV grants to support the publishing of our animal shelter data, a new trend in the animal welfare sector designed to understand trends in order to increase lifesaving.
3. During “Maddie’s Pet Adoption Days” from 2013-2015, they sponsored all adoption fees here at HSSV. Our adoption fees were waived, and we completed hundreds of adoptions during these days. In recognition of their amazing support, we named the driveway here at HSSV “Maddie’s Way.”
4. Maddie’s Fund awarded us with a Marketing Award in 2014 for our efforts to find homes for hard-to-place animals. We were one of two winners in the “Social Media” category.
5. They have sponsored three years of Kitten Apprenticeships at HSSV. With their support, we’re able to host staff and volunteers from shelters from all over the country to share ideas and strategies to improve lifesaving for kittens.
   
6. They provided a grant to help us create a collaborative marketing campaign with the San Francisco 49ers to promote pet adoption in the Bay Area.
7. A Maddie’s Fund Innovation Grant was used to add kiosks in our adoptions lobby to help us reduce wait times for adopters and serve our increasing number of customers better.
8. Maddie’s Fund grants helped us revamp our Cat Volunteer program by retraining volunteers to help us support adopters. This program was modeled after our successful Dog Volunteer revamp the year prior.
9. They provided support to implement Feline Foster Mentors in our Feline Foster program to allow foster volunteers to move up a level and train and support fellow volunteers. This allowed us to take burden off staff and gave a pathway for highly dedicated volunteers to expand their roles.
10. Through an Innovation Grant, Maddie’s Fund supported our efforts to revamp our foster care program for dogs by expanding the types of dogs who were candidates for our foster program, including easy-to-adopt dogs who needed foster care for very short periods of time to allow us to increase space at our shelter.
11. They gave us an Innovation Grant that allows us to provide shelter consults in which staff members visit other shelters to offer suggestions for improvements in operations. This allows us to build better partnerships with our rescue partners, and increases the health of the animals that are adopted from those shelters and the ones we rescue and bring to our shelter.
12. This year, Maddie’s Fund provided the funding needed for us to pilot a spay/neuter and wellness clinic for the pets of people experiencing homelessness. These clinics take place both at the San Jose Animal Care Center once a month, and within encampments themselves to help provide service to as many pets and people as possible.
13. Over the years, they have provided support for our staff to speak at conferences and share our expertise in shelter medicine and leadership with other organization in the animal welfare sector.
14. Several of our staff members have been accepted into apprenticeships funded by Maddie’s Fund.
15. One of our staff members on the foster team was accepted as an apprentice to learn more about foster programs targeted at large dogs.
16. An adoptions team member was part of an apprenticeship to learn how to adopt out more long-term cats.
17. A veterinary technician on our team was selected to be an apprentice to learn more about shelter medicine and how to serve as support staff on a medical team within an animal shelter.
18. HSSV President Carol Novello received a Maddie’s Hero Award (which came with a $10k grant for HSSV!) to recognize her leadership, promotion of innovation, progressive thinking and lifesaving actions.
19. Most recently, Maddie’s Fund created an Executive Leadership Fellowship program at HSSV. Starting in January, two fellows were selected from a highly talented pool of applicants to spend a year at HSSV learning leadership related to animal welfare.
20. They help to connect organizations to help support innovation and cross-functional creativity through tools like the Maddie’s Forum, a message board used by shelters to share ideas and offer support.
21. Maddie’s Fund has served as a collaborative sounding board for our organization. We can share big ideas with them and receive positive and constructive feedback to help as achieve our goals and try new things.
22. They have provided financial support for marketing for Mutual Rescue’s Doggy Day Out program. This support has allowed the Doggy Day Out program to expand to shelters all over the country, giving shelters (including HSSV!) a way to manage energy and kennel stress for big dogs and give them exposure in their community.
23. They provide webinars and other training opportunities to help professionals in animal welfare increase their skills and build on their knowledge. Our own staff have benefited from these trainings in things like creating an awesome foster program and marketing to get long-term animals adopted.
24. They provide tons of marketing to bring awareness to homeless animals, from blog posts to social media, Maddie’s Fund is constantly looking for new and innovative ways to champion the shelters they support.
25. By investing in complex, lifesaving programs, Maddie’s Fund has a far-reaching effect. They focus on areas like reducing length of stay (which frees up space for other animals) or investing in shelter medicine to keep animals healthy during their stays in shelters.

We are so grateful to Maddie’s Fund for their support, creativity, innovation, and investments. For 25 years, Maddie’s Fund has worked to champion and advance the animal welfare sector and the many shelters and people who work hard day in and day out to save the lives of animals. #ThanksToMaddie!