Puget Sound pet adoption events

Last year, Best Friends awarded a $7,500 grant to an animal organization in the Seattle area. The money went towards supporting the organization's highly innovative, effective and collaborative adoption program. Since then, Pawsitive Alliance has proven again and again how well deserved that grant was.

Pet adoption events in Puget Sound area

Pawsitive Alliance organizes and promotes adoption events in the urban Puget Sound area and invites multiple rescue groups and shelters from Washington's rural areas to participate in them. The rationale: Pets stand a much greater chance of getting adopted around the Puget Sound than in Washington's rural areas, especially on the east side of the Cascades, where there is an overabundance of adoptable pets and little demand for them. Since 2008, Pawsitive Alliance's events have resulted in more than 1,600 dog and cat adoptions.

Pawsitive Alliance is a participating group in Best Friends' Network Charities, a program that lends support to local groups, helping bring about a time of No More Homeless Pets.

Dog and cat adoptions

In March, Pawsitive Alliance organized the Lucky Dog Adoption Event at the Academy of Canine Behavior in Bothell. In a matter of three hours, a whopping 81 dogs found homes.

Pawsitive Alliance followed up with the April Drools Adoption Event, again at the Academy of Canine Behavior, at which 75 dogs found homes in three hours. On the same day, 24 cats found a home at the Woodinville Whiskers Adoption Event, held at the Woodinville PetSmart.

The April Drools Event was particularly satisfying for founder and president Andrea Logan.

"We probably had the biggest turnout we've ever had," she says. Because Pawsitive Alliance allows only a certain number of people into their events at one time, a line usually forms outside during the first 30 minutes or so, but then dissipates. Andrea says there was a line during the entirety of April Drools.

"It shows people really want to adopt," she says.

At the Woodinville event, two kittens named Collette and Riannon found a single home together. Collette was found abandoned on the side of the road, while Riannon was found as a stray. A regular participant in Pawsitive Alliance's events, Purrfect Pals of Arlington received the two cats from a shelter in Wenatchee and brought the two to the Woodinville event. Kept separate at Purrfect Pals, they had never had contact before the event, but they would bond before going home with Julie and Howie Cohen and their 10-year-old son, David.

A few weeks before the event, the Cohens had lost their 15-year-old cat to kidney/thyroid disease - which was particularly hard on the family since the cat had been a balm to David, a sufferer of Tourrette's syndrome."We couldn't stand not having a kitty," Julie says.

At the event, David went inside Purrfect Pal's tent and sat down on the floor. At that moment, Riannon strolled over to him and sat in his lap. David took that as a sign that Riannon was the cat for them.

But then Riannon climbed into a bed and curled up with Collette.

"David interpreted that as "take my friend too," Julie says.

So the family adopted both Collette and Riannon and renamed them Ginger and Stella.

Of course, there are stories galore like the one of the Cohen family and their two new cats. Pawsitive Alliance helps make those stories possible - by going to great lengths to make their adoption events as fun and attractive as possible, drawing people to them who might otherwise be hesitant about going into a shelter and adopting.

About the Best Friends Network partners:

Best Friends Network partners are rescue groups and shelters that are working towards a time of No More Homeless Pets. Program members are offered special opportunities including fundraising and adoption events, grants, workshops, webinars, resources, and volunteer recruitment through our database of animal lovers.

Photo by Best Friends staff and courtesy of Pawsitive Alliance and Purrfect Pals