Good Works

Olympic Pet Pals connect with therapy dogs

Organization provides spay-neuter services

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Since the start of the 21st Century, Olympic Mountain Pet Pals has been extending a helping hand to low-income pet owners, but in the nearly two decades since, they’ve also branched out into connecting both retired seniors and budding young readers with loyal, affectionate animal buddies.

Pat Swain, a board member for OMPP, recalled its origins in 2001 as a nonprofit to provide funds for spaying and neutering services to low-income families who own pets.

Swain reported that OMPP has helped spay and neuter 5,151 house pets, as well as 2,314 feral and abandoned cats, in the subsequent 17 years. It also has provided low-income pet-owning households with emergency services for veterinarian bills through Ginger’s Fund.

Swain said OMPP began as an offshoot of Jefferson County Animal Services, when its board members saw the need to address the problem of cat and dog overpopulation in Jefferson County.

“A program to provide financial assistance for low-income households’ cats and dogs, and a trap-neuter program for feral cats were established with the assistance and guidance of several local veterinarians,” Swain said. “These programs enable our local shelter to have a live-release rate of 96 percent.”

The organization changed its name to Olympic Mountain Pet Pals in 2004 in order to distinguish it from the animal shelter operation.

OMPP also runs two outreach programs: Pets to People, which sends pets to visit seniors at facilities such as the Life Care Center, Avamere and Victoria Place to help brighten their days; and Read to Rover, which allows students at Chimacum Creek Primary, Salish Coast Elementary and the Quilcene School District to read to dogs.

Marsha Wiener started Pets to People by taking therapy dogs into assisted-living homes.

“It brings joy to the residents to interact with dogs,” Swain said, adding that roughly half a dozen teams of dogs and handlers serve the three aforementioned assisted-living centers. “We often get to hear stories about the dogs the residents used to own. They love reminiscing, and it was those dogs they were petting at the moment that brought such memories back to them.”

Kate Schumann started Read to Rover, first at the Port Townsend Public Library, then at Grant Street Elementary.

“She was inspired by her own love of literacy, and her exposure to literature, to use therapy dogs to help young readers,” Swain said. “We expanded to Chimacum Creek Primary in 2009 and included the Quilcene schools in 2015.”

Chimacum Creek Primary is currently served by 16 teams of Read to Rover dogs and handlers, serving a total of 64 students each week.

“Each of them makes a commitment to be there for their ‘forever kids’ every week,” Swain said. “We’re still waiting for the go-ahead to start at Salish Coast Elementary, which used to be Grant Street Elementary, but there are 11 therapy-dog teams ready to begin again in the new school, as soon as they are ready for us.”

Swain said OMPP is a volunteer-run organization with no office and little overhead.

“One person handles the low-income spay/neuter program,” Swain said. “Another one handles the feral/community cat program, to trap, neuter and return them. Our hours vary, depending on the number of applications and calls for each service, but our veterinary expenses run about $35,000 per year. Fortunately, the only expense for the therapy-dog programs is for liability insurance.”

Swain deemed OMPP’s greatest need as financial donations to pay for veterinary services.

“The community can support us by donating as generously as they can, and by urging people to spay and neuter their pets, as well as publicizing our own spay-and-neuter programs throughout Jefferson County,” Swain said. “We believe that our programs are of great importance to the community and hope to be able to continue them. With sufficient funds, and, hopefully, more volunteer and board members, we will be able to do that.”

For more information, visit ompetpals.org.