OTAT receives prestigious award
from Best Friends Animal Society!
“I recently told the executive director here that if I were an animal rescue group, I’d want to be just like them when I grew up! One Tail at a Time has built a community organization that is constantly growing and evolving to meet the needs of the pets and people where they live. They’ve helped shelter partners and families with pets, and have had a huge lifesaving impact in Chicago.” – Stacy Rogers, Best Friends Midwest regional director
One Tail at a Time has been recognized with the Collective Impact award from Best Friends Animal Society, a national animal welfare organization dedicated to ending the killing of dogs and cats in America’s shelters!
This award is given to organizations and state coalitions that demonstrate outstanding ability to support fellow partners and work collaboratively toward a common goal.
One Tail at a Time is a member of the Best Friends Network , which comprises thousands of animal shelters, spay/neuter organizations, and other 501(c)(3) public charity rescue groups across all 50 states working to save the lives of dogs and cats in their communities.
Together, Best Friends and its network partners are working to achieve no-kill for dogs and cats nationwide by 2025. Reaching this goal will mean that every shelter in our country is getting the community support it needs to save every dog and cat who can be saved. It means healing the animals who can be healed, treating behaviors that can be treated, and prioritizing public health, safety, and a high quality of life for both pets and people in our communities. When a shelter is saving at least 90% of the dogs and cats it’s admitting, that shelter is designated as no-kill. A no-kill community is a city or town in which every brick-and-mortar shelter serving or located within that community has reached a 90% save rate or higher and adheres to the no-kill philosophy.
One Tail at a Time was selected for the Collective Impact award based on national shelter data and work from calendar year 2019 (compared to 2018). National, state, and shelter level data can be found on the pet lifesaving dashboard published by Best Friends.
“It’s incredible to see so many shelters around the nation taking dramatic steps to increase lifesaving,” said Brent Toellner, senior director, national programs for Best Friends Animal Society. “Whether it be through new programming, progressive leadership or better collaborative partnerships, these groups are showing that lifesaving success is possible regardless of a shelter’s size or location.”
“I recently told the executive director here that if I were an animal rescue group, I’d want to be just like them when I grew up! One Tail at a Time has built a community organization that is constantly growing and evolving to meet the needs of the pets and people where they live. They’ve helped shelter partners and families with pets, and have had a huge lifesaving impact in Chicago.”
– Stacy Rogers, Best Friends Midwest regional director
Toellner added: “ It’s going to take embracing all models of lifesaving, as well as maximizing collaboration with and support of each other to reach our goal of ending the killing of pets in shelters by 2025. But with so much progress being made, getting our nation to a point where it has finally put a stop to the unnecessary deaths of animals in shelters not only seems possible, but inevitable.”
