The SICSA pet adoption agency adopts out more than 2,000 pets a year, and places even more in foster homes annually.
With Hurricane Milton moving through Florida, WYSO’s Jerry Kenney reports how that mission has become increasingly urgent.
This story has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Jerry Kenney: A lot of the kennels are filled at SICSA. Just this week, the agency received its first shipment of dogs and cats displaced by Hurricane Helene. Mary Wren, director of communications and donor relations, shows me the newest arrivals, mostly puppies and kittens who have come from other shelters affected by the storm. After a short tour of the facility, we head to her office where she tells me more animals are on the way.
Mary Wrenn: We're always looking to grow our foster base, but in particular with taking in these animals, we're seeing a big increase in larger dogs, larger breeds. I guess they're harder to take with you when you experience a disaster like this. And so we're really looking for people who are willing to take that size. And whether it's from Asheville or Florida, anyone affected by the hurricane, but also just taking in our dogs as well so that we can make room for some of these that are coming in from the disaster.
Kenney: You have some new arrivals already and I'm sure that process will continue as shelters are able to help out in this situation?
Wrenn: Yes, absolutely. So we went ahead and did one intake of 15 pets. That was a mix of cats and dogs, puppies and kittens. So we are expecting that to increase in particular because they've cleared out the shelters at this point. But now they're starting to see some owner surrenders, sadly. So we're expecting the need will grow over the next few weeks.
Kenney: And you're helping out because of the totality of Helene, so you're helping other shelters who may have lost power or even lost use of their facilities.
Wrenn: Yes, exactly. So what we're hearing is that it's going to be a few months before they even get water back. And then additionally electricity will be even longer. So they're really expecting long term cleanup. So they're clearing out the shelters and in-taking as they can when they get additional owner surrenders.
Kenney: I imagine communication on efforts like this start even perhaps before storms arrive. There's an established network. Is that correct?
Wrenn: Yes. So actually, we've been looking into that ourselves as well, working with our friends over at Best Friends Animal Shelter and at different shelters that were impacted. So we are really working to collect supplies as well to bring down when we go to do these transports. So we already took one load down last week and we're we're collecting supplies. We have an Amazon wishlist actually that is on our website and social media, and we're collecting supplies to bring down that they may need anything from generators, portable heaters, any supplies that they've identified that they need. We're adding it to the wish list as needed.
Kenney: Let's talk about expectations of fostering and how people might become involved.
Wrenn: Yeah. So our foster program is actually very extensive. You can foster pets anywhere from a walk in the park to taking them for 60 to 90 days. So we provide all of the supplies needed, the food, cat litter, anything that is needed in the home. We just ask for a place for them to be for a little bit while either their owners get back on their feet or if they're up for adoption and until they find their permanent loving home. So we have a lot of options for them.
Kenney: And the contact information to do so?
Wrenn: Yeah. So you can actually apply to be a foster on our website www.sicsa.org. and there you can fill out a little questionnaire. It'll ask you specifically what types of pets you're able to take, in what ages, different levels of activity. So you can just populate all of that and we'll reach out to you when we have pets. And that match that profile.
