It's been a while since I've blogged. One would think since I have a board of directors and three amazing staff members, I'd be able to get more blogging done. Seems with more people helping, more is getting done and I find myself spinning around in circles and being personally unproductive.
Joanne Roehm who is doing her level best to turn Carol's Ferals into an ORGANIZATION vs A ONE MAN PONY SHOW is making HUGE STRIDES. I credit her with pretty much everything since before she came to me with sickly, cold abandoned kittens, I was nothing short of a mess.
I never thought I'd say this, but I'm glad that mama cat abandoned her kittens. Carol's Ferals has come a LONG WAY BABY! We could practically be a Virginia Slims advertisement.
Truly, I'm nothing short of blessed. Since Joanne started to fill my head with visions of sugar plums, a board of directors, staff members, annual fund raiser campaigns, adoption events and an accountant to help me.....this old dog has been learning lots of new tricks. I've not completely mastered them all, but I'm getting better.
To begin. Each week we have a staff meeting. Currently we have these meetings at The Sparrows in East Town. At first it was just Joanne and I. But now I have Jolyn Clark who is officially titled "Adoption Coordinator" and Sheri Meadows who is our "Rehab Facilities Manager". These two amazing women have taken over some of the stuff that I had to do all by myself for the past few years. With the exception of volunteers at Brooknelle and Pat Baxter, I did all that stuff myself. The best thing now is that I have these two dynamos taking over the biggest responsibilities of the Rescue.
Jolyn tends to all the adoptables at Carol's Ferals. She, along with Vic Cabot do bi-monthly cat checks on all the cats which means that twice a month they truck over to my place and take care of all my foster adults as well as maintaining the kittens who reside with her. Since taking over the position of Adoption Coordinator she has brought in volunteers to help socialize and maintain the cats at both foster locals and has organized already TWO adoption events at Centerpointe Mall resulting in the adoption of 9 cats and kittens.
Sheri Meadows started to volunteer after I really did nothing more than talk her off the ledge when she found some kittens under a brush pile in her backyard. It was probably the most effective call back I've ever made. Cuz for some reason, I being the only person who had any sort of advice or offer of help for her HIT THE FLIPPING JACKPOT when she decided it was going to be Carol's Ferals that would benefit from her extreme dedication to TNR and the smooth operations at Brooknelle. And it was one of the last calls I've had to return because now, she handles most all the incoming cat calls saving my sanity.
With Gina Marvin taking personal time away from TNR to the general public for a while, it's all falling on us. We get about 40 calls per week. Sheri returns them all.
Jason Buys came to me to get some TNR help/guidance and adopt a kitten. I helped him with the TNR of a sweet adult girl who never shut up. He affectionately named her "Carol". I had Carol with me at Brooknelle for a while as he went out of town shortly after capturing her. After that he adopted a sweet kitten through his vet and decided that kitten needed a playmate as his 8 year old existing cat found kitten to be a TRIAL. So little Jasper got a friend. Jason renamed Carol, Pumpkin and now he has three cats. AND A NEW BEST FRIEND. Cuz he and his wife are my kind of people and enjoy being crazy while laid back and Angie makes an amazing Finish pancake. It's the most wonderful thing in the world. We hang out together often. But I digress. Jason turned me on to some life saving (ok maybe not life saving....but for sure SANITY SAVING) systems to help me manage my overwhelming incoming calls.
All calls that I don't answer go into a system where they are sent to me as a text message or an email with text transcription and ability to listen to them as an MP3. If you need such a system, go to jott.com. It's only $20 per month unless you have an unbelievable amount of calls like me, then it's like $75 a month. But being able to forward phone calls in the form of emails to Sheri for call back at the rate of about 40 per week is worth any amount of money in the worlds. Though when Google Voice is introduced to this area for FREE, I'll be jumping on that train fo sho!
These god sends along with Joanne, the one who started it all are going to take Carol's Ferals to a WHOLE NEW LEVEL. My goal is to make TNR a household word. I want everyone to know "Just because you can't touch them, doesn't mean you can't help them". And with these people on board, we are on our way.
Speaking of ON BOARD.....I have a Board of Directors. I was afraid to have a Board of Directors cuz I was a little afraid to have anyone tell me what to do. True, my board can fire me at any time, but if I am doing anything that isn't in the best interest on the Rescue, I'll be happy to be ousted by this fantastic group of people.
Joanne Roehm sits on the board along with Jim Schalk who has been bringing me cats pretty much since I started doing larger scale TNR. Always a great supporter of Carol's Ferals, he brings a really great sense of "looking out for the best for the organization" and he is always on the ready to do whatever I need him to.
Kolene Allen has been doing her own TNR for 10 years. She was trapping and fixing cats before I even knew what a live trap was. She's a real renegade and is like minded in that she would do anything to help an animal in need. Currently she's revamping the website. We will be launching the new site in January!
Matt Jarrells is the Program Director for WYCE. Lots of media contacts has he. And lots of love for animals too. Matt created a fan page for Carol's Ferals on Facebook and we are getting lots of folks joining us. Please join if you haven't.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Carols-Ferals/190766910232?ref=tsMatt's girlfriend Jessica volunteers cuddling kittens at Jolyn's.
Evan Rossio is an attorney who is already invaluable to Carol's Ferals. He is going to help keep me legal and hopefully out of jail someday! : ) Just Kidding. OK.....maybe not, one never knows the lengths I will go to to help an animals. I figure if I didn't have Evan on the board, Kolene and I might be cell mates some day. He adopted two kittens from us this summer!
All is coming along swimmingly well with regard to the organization.
Now, also coming along nicely is BROOKNELLE. Gabby is back in town and he has gone hog wild improving systems at Brooknelle. Give that man 15 minutes to look over a situation and he will come up with a list of things that can be made better. And will fund most of them to boot.
In photos you will see the biggest overhauls. One is the addition to much needed flood lighting outside the two garage doors. That is a lifesaver. Not sure how I managed in the dark all this time.
You will also see that a foam-core wall was put up over the garage door of the intake unit. Now with a screen door in place, we can see who is outside and not have to raise and lower the jankety door that was nearly off the tracks and saved from devastation by Jim Schalk in the early fall.
This door saves a lot of heat and energy too. That room is now 70 degrees without any heater running at all. Volunteers are encouraged to wear swimsuits to work.
There's also this fantastic addition of a LED read out sign that tells waiting clients of our hours, what we do, and details our wish list. But waiting clients need not stand outside any longer. With the nifty "take a number" system, they can wait in their cars in warmth and simply come out when their number is called. And if they want a pound of salami and provalone to go along with it, they can get it at the deli counter inside. Just kidding!
Thank you Gabby for giving all your time and dedication
to the fabrication of these wonderful improvements.
I am truly blessed to have great people around me, helping me bring Carol's Ferals to a new level of organization where we can help more cats and make TNR a household word!
: ) Carol
