SAVE OUR SHELTER

2020 has been a rough year... so we are waving our S.O.S flag! We need YOUR help to Save Our Shelter. With the financial burden that Covid-19 has caused from a decrease in donations and the proposed site location and donated land no longer being feasible we were on the cusp of pausing our capital campaign. We were struggling to keep our heads above water, when an anonymous donor appeared! This donor has graciously offered to match all donations, up to $500,000, that are made to our capital campaign from November 27th-December 1st.

Its time to give homeless dogs and cats in Dorchester County a fighting chance. If you have been inside Dorchester Paws the only shelter in the County you've seen the struggles the aging facility is up against.

Already this year, the 48-year-old shelter has had to close three times due to flooding. Closing means turning away animals in need while the Dorchester Paws staff work in emergency mode. When the forecast calls for heavy rain, dogs and cats are shuffled to a nearby middle school gym or taken to other shelters across the Lowcountry. Imagine the stress this puts on these homeless animals.

The buildings condition causes a devastating ripple effect. Loving families looking to adopt see a depressing shelter and stay away. Or they turn around at the door. The dogs and cats inside never even get the chance to become their forever pet. The shelter is also continuously over capacity. The shelter holds only 181 animals, but today we have over 300 in our care, many in foster homes.

Your community and the innocent animals of Dorchester deserve better than this. When the shelter closes because of weather, other critical operations are shut down. Basic regular animal care must be secondary to the emergency needs of the animals, they sometimes cant get the medicine they need. Homeless puppies and kittens are turned away because staff are focused on moving the animals already inside to safety. The shelters staff do everything they can to make the broken shelter work, but there is only so much they can do. And its only a matter of time until the stop-gap maintenance efforts stop working.

Fortunately, there is a solution that will transform the lives of thousands of animals. A campaign to build a new shelter that will give dogs and cats hope.