InFocus featuring Dakin Humane Society ED Meg Talbert

From the 22 News Plus Studio, this is 22 News In Focus with Patrick Berry. Hello everyone and welcome to this edition of In Focus. I'm your host Patrick Berry. If you know me from this show or from Mass Appeal, you know I love animals. I got my little beagle, Tucker, who's about 13 years old and we just, we're a dog family in my house. I had a cat at one point in time. But pets are so important to families. They teach kids responsibility, life skills and so forth and they're our little buddies. And, you know, if you're thinking of adopting or fostering or whatever, you need to pay attention to today's interview because sitting across the desk from me, from Dakin Humane, is their Executive Director, Meg Talbert. Meg, thank you so very much for joining me today. Greatly appreciate you coming in here. It's a pleasure, thank you. Through my Mass Appeal days, six and a half, five and a half years, excuse me, on Mass Appeal, Lee Chambers would come in every Thursday. We would do Pet of the Week and I had great restraint in not taking home one of the animals that Lee would bring in, which kind of begged me to the question to have you here of how does Dakin do what it does? But before we get into that, I want to talk a little bit about you and how you ended up in the role of leading Dakin. Is animal care and something that gets close to home? Did you go to school for it? Tell me a little bit about you. Sure. So I grew up in Central Connecticut and then moved to Massachusetts when I attended Boston University and was involved in some sciences. I actually have an English degree. Got involved in some non-profit work with some animals as well as PR and marketing work while I was at school and just found my way to non-profit and worked in the program aspect of things in non-profit in the early stages of my career and had the opportunities and some great people that helped me with some training and to get some more experience with all things fundraising and non-profit management and marketing. So really, my entire career has been in non-profit. Most recently, prior to coming to Dakin, I worked for Wayfinders here in Springfield for over five years. That was a tremendous experience and a great way for me to learn about the region, about the valley, and the needs of the people in the valley. And lo and behold, I received a call, actually an email one day from a recruiter who was looking to fill the role for Dakin's ED and I absolutely jumped at that opportunity just knowing what Dakin did in the community and the tremendous work that they do. I wanted to learn more. You bring up a very good point. You mentioned it a few times about the non-profit world. I don't know if a lot of people understand Dakin is a non-profit. So you do most of a lot of fundraising, but different from a lot of other non-profits, you've got care needs 24-7. So that's a tough glass of water to swallow. That is. We are one of Massachusetts' largest open admission shelters, meaning that our doors are open. We help people at any time, whereas we try to manage the flow of our animals so that we can have as many coming in as going out. That's a tightrope. That's a balancing act. We're there for the community. We try to get information ahead of time, but we also deal with people who walk in and are having an emergency and our team responds. So we are non-profit and we are supported by individual donations, corporate donations, grants, and we manage that money very wisely. We would not be able to have the impact we do without the support from the community. So it's more than just putting animals up for adoption. There's medical care that goes alongside it, right? Tremendous amount of medical care. So when animals come in, they're getting their initial exam, but then we're determining whether or not they need some additional follow-up care, if they have an injury, an illness. Actually, nearly 34% of the animals that we took in last year needed some level of additional medical care before they were ready for adoption. And our team, that's where our team comes in. That's where obviously our fundraising comes in, but also the importance of our foster families that sometimes will provide homes for animals that need some extra time, need some extra care before they're ready for their adoptive homes. You know, it's funny. I learned the phrase through Lee and my time on Mass Appeal about foster fails, and that would be me. But that's a good thing. Foster fail sounds like a negative, but foster fail is great because a volunteer fosters to care for a pet, and then they just fall in love with them. Yep. The fosters may fall in love, or somebody in their network, or their family, or their friends may meet this animal that they're fostering, and they have a home. I actually, after three years, had my first foster fail this year. Dog, cat, small? Little pit bull named Franny. Good for you. And she came from a home. It was a difficult situation with some overcrowding. She needed some extra time and attention, and she just, I said, oh, it's a long weekend. I'll take her home for a long weekend. I'll introduce her to my other pit bull, who's 13 years old, and my other pit bull will teach her how to dog, right? Teach her how to be outside, how to live in a house, and things that she was a little afraid of. Three days, and my husband said to me, we're keeping this dog. And I said, no, no, no, we're not keeping this dog. And everybody kind of made fun of me because they were like, you're keeping this dog. And yeah, Franny's been with me now for almost five months. That's fantastic. Good for you. But that network of fostering animals and the volunteers that do that, it certainly sounds like an extremely important part of what Dakin does. Absolutely. We could not do what we do without our foster families. And as much as the shelter is, it's a clean, safe environment full of professionals that do this work. There's nothing like an individual home for an animal, and the needs for foster care is great. And we always want people to understand foster care, yes, it could be a couple of weeks. It can also be a couple of days, taking a dog out of the shelter when we're closed on Sunday, Monday, even a few days' work. Getting in a home is so important to a pet or to an animal. Yeah. And we learn so much about how they behave in a home, in the shelter. The shelter's a loud, different environment. They're away from their home. But when they get into a new home, we're seeing, are they interested in the other animals in the home? Are they interested in all of the people that they meet? Are they a little bit more reserved? Are they super outgoing? We're learning all of these things so that we can have all that information for potential adopters. Fantastic. We are up on our first commercial break. Stay with us. We've got plenty more to talk about when it comes to Dakin Humane. We're right back after this. Welcome back, everyone, to this edition of In Focus. We're here in the 22 News Plus studios. I am your host, Patrick Berry. Sitting across from me from Dakin Humane Society is their Executive Director, Meg Talbert. Meg, thank you for joining me. I appreciate it. We covered a lot of ground in the first portion of this discussion, and there's so much more to cover. But what I want to ask you is, where do the animals come from that you care for and that people then adopt from you? Sure. The majority of our animals come locally here from Hamden, Hampshire, and Franklin counties. Dakin does prioritize local first. So the needs of our local community, those animals are getting prioritized. But when we have room, we do do transfers, particularly mostly transfers of dogs from down south. So we have several partners that we work with that have, as you know, a lot of overcrowding is still happening down in the southern part of the country. So when we have room and availability, we'll transport dogs from our southern partners. And so those are dogs. So actually, I should have asked you this first. What types of animals do you deal with? Is it just like household pet type animals? So we don't do any exotic animals or reptiles. We do cats, dogs, small animals. So guinea pigs, we do birds, rabbits, all sorts of small animals as well. Did you have a chinchilla once or twice? I think that's pretty rare, but I think it's possible. Yes. But it is neat, though, that you have a variety. And as I said earlier, pet care is so important for families, especially kids. So if you don't want a dog or a cat, a guinea pig is a great entry. Absolutely. I mean, I've gotten to know more about rats and people that have rats as pets, and they can make terrific pets as well. So it really is, we have something for everybody. And again, some people are looking for that puppy or that kitten, but other people in our community are very interested in adopting a senior pet. And we're extremely fortunate for that, that people want to give a senior pet a loving home. You know, it's funny because older pets more often than not are housebroken. Yep. So you don't have that puppy anxiety or the chewing or scratching of a puppy or kitten. Wearing my slippers. Yeah. I've done a one now. But yeah, so I love, because I adopted, our dog was three. So he wasn't senior, but we had been through the puppy stage and I was like, let's find something a little bit more mature. And that's the incredible thing about our staff members and also our foster families. They look at each individual animal as an individual. They learn about them. They can help counsel a prospective adopter on what we know about this pet and what we might expect that pet's going to be like in a home. So when you take an animal in, let's stick dogs and cats for a moment. You give them all the medical care and you've got a full veterinary staff that they go through all these animals to make sure they're healthy. And then you don't foster them or, or adopt them out until you know, they're in great health. Yeah. We want to make sure that these animals are healthy, that they're getting age appropriate vaccines. And also all the animals that are adopted from Dakin get spay neuter surgery prior to their adoptions. All of them. Oh, wow. So, but there's a cost to that, which I guess is part of the fundraising side of it. But you know, people say, you know, they, they, they come to Dakin and they say, oh, wow. It's, you know, it's the, how much to adopt it. You know, I just want to adopt it. But the cost of care is way more than the cost of adoption. Do I have that right? Yes, absolutely. I mean, you have to think about us having 60 to 65 employees at any given time, providing all of the care across all of our departments at Dakin, medical care, husbandry, volunteers that come in to do enrichment. We're really investing in these animals and certainly all the needs of our building, their food, their electricity, our water bill. You wouldn't want to know what that is. So yes, there, it costs us about $980 per animal when you kind of divide it all out amongst, amongst, and you know, some animals, they come in, they're healthy, they're there, get their check and they're gone the next day. Others can be with us for weeks and sometimes months because they need the care that they need. Right. And if you are folks, if you've already owned a pet and you've been to a vet, you know, those costs can be expensive. So the adoption fee is really just the drop in the bucket compared to the care. It is. And I always want to remember, remind adopters too, when you adopt from Dakin, you're not only helping the animal you're adopting, you're also helping the next animal and you're making space for the next animal that needs to come into Dakin for care. And that is a really powerful message. And you spay and neuter, which is so crucial because then you don't have that, that cycle of more cats and puppies and guinea pigs and whatever being born that you kind of, you're, you're stopping at. That's right. We do also have a mom's fix free program. So people in the community that may have a litter unexpectedly and need to have their female pet be spayed. We have a program in which, you know, we will come, they can bring in, you know, the puppies or the kittens. And we will take those puppies and kittens for adoption and for, for their care. And we'll spay mom so that we don't have any more unwanted litters. But yeah, our spay neuter clinic, I mean, over 8,700 surgeries in last year. So they're doing not only all of our surgeries at Dakin. So all of the animals that come in for adoptive care, but they're doing public animals as well. And you know, their wait list is, is several months out and some, and sometimes we do our best. The team there is absolutely incredible. The amount of surgeries that they're able to do every day and the quality of care that they give to animals. But I would just advise anybody that's looking for a spay neuter at Dakin, make your appointment early because it might be a little bit of a wait. Right. Where do, when, when you get cats, because cats, I think are, and please correct me if I'm wrong, I'm just an outsider looking into what you do. I think cats are more, what's the phrase? They breed at a more regular pace than dogs and, you know, and families, so they're outdoor cats. There are cats everywhere. I hate to say it. So do you, do people surrender pets? Do you guys go out and find these cats and communities and kind of bring them in, spay, neuter, and then adopt them out? A little bit of all of the above. People will call us if they've had an unwanted litter in their home, or sometimes people say, you know, somebody moved out from the apartment downstairs and there's some kittens. Can we bring them in? We also have our kitten street team that responds to outdoor cats that are having litters and they help try to trap the feral cats, get them spayed and neutered, and then they become outdoor cats. They can go back to their homes once they're spayed and neutered. But if there's kittens outdoors as well, they help trap those and bring those into Dakin for care. Usually adoption, if the kittens are young enough that they can acclimate to humans, if they're, if they're a little bit older and, you know, once they're, they're healthy, they can go back out into the community after spay and neuter. So going back in time to, to when Dakin was first formed, what is it, 60 years ago, closer or close to 60 years ago, it's changed a lot in those decades. Yeah. And I think that's the incredible thing about Dakin is how flexible we've been over the years, really listening and watching the needs of the community and responding to those needs. And it really is because of our staff, our supporters, that we're in the position to look at the future and say, what are going to be the highest priorities going to be? For example, in 2022, we opened our pet health center, and that has been an incredible resource for owned animals, cats and dogs. It's an accessible, affordable veterinary care with extremely high standards. It's, it's just like any other vet that you go into, into anywhere else. But we are here in the community. So many of our patients, you know, walk or they travel just from a few blocks down. They've never had access to, to veterinary care in the past that they can afford. We have incredible bilingual staff on board as well, which is just of utmost importance to us. We are up on our second commercial break, stay with us. We're back in just a few minutes with more. Welcome back everyone to today's edition of In Focus. We're here in the 22 News Plus studios sitting across the desk from me. I'm very happy to have Meg Talbert. She's the Executive Director of Dakin Humane Society. Meg, thank you for joining me. Appreciate your time. One of the things we kind of glossed over a little bit earlier is the importance of volunteers for what you do. You are a nonprofit and virtually every nonprofit part of their existence is recruiting volunteers to maintain the success of the organization. But really how important is volunteers for Dakin because it's a 24-7 operation because you're dealing with live animals. It's hard to even find the words to describe how important our volunteers are. We have over 400 volunteers in all different aspects of Dakin's life. So we have people that come in, whether or not they're helping us clean and feed the animals, providing enrichment to the animals that are in the facility, people that come walk dogs. We also have people that help upstairs in the offices, fundraising volunteers, people that help us with events, people that serve as greeters when our adoption center is open to help direct people to the appropriate staff and keep things flowing on busy days. We even have a thrift store that is all volunteer run at Dakin. So are there certain ages like, you know, I think of like really two distinct groups, maybe high school kids who are looking to kind of gain life experience working in a nonprofit and helping others to even even the retirees who just looking to fill their day with something, interaction with people, interaction with animals. Do you look for all those groups? Sure. And that's the thing. We have a lot of a variety of different roles. 16 and up is is generally for younger people to come in and volunteer. But like you said, we've got a lot of people that are retired. A lot of people of this is what I do on my Tuesdays and my Fridays and people that come in on the weekends when we're a little bit more short staffed and people that volunteer across all aspects of the organization. Many of them are with the Adoption Center, but we have volunteers that help our Pet Health Center, volunteers that help our spay and neuter clinic. It's just a really incredible group of people that the camaraderie between staff and volunteers and the mutual appreciation is so great. It's really fantastic, fantastic to see. So but again, you're a nonprofit, so there's a fundraising aspect to it. So and you do and I learned through my Mass Peel Days, you do a number of fundraisers through through the year. But as we talked about, you brought it up earlier, you know, the average cost per care per pet is somewhere between $950,000 and $950,000. But the adoption costs are so much lower. So it seems to me that an organization like Dakin fundraising is really a crucial element to to keep the organization afloat. It is. And that comes from all different levels, whether it's $100 donation or it's a $10,000 donation. It's making a difference at Dakin. And I do encourage people to give local. If you want to help animals, give local. Your donation dollars are going to be well spent and appreciated at Dakin and they're going to go direct into community need. One of the things I learned about Dakin, and I don't know, I don't know if this is normal. You probably know better than I across the fundraising world is you can set up so maybe I don't have, you know, you know, $1,200 handy right now, but I could set it up so I donate $100 a month and it just it automatically goes there. Exactly. And those gifts sustain us. And it means a lot for people. People give what they can. Our donors are are wonderful. I get the opportunity to to make calls, make thank you calls. And people are so grateful. They're thanking us for what we're doing. And it's always nice to say, well, I got my cat five years ago from Dakin. I got my cat seven years ago, my dog. People are very connected to animals. But our donors also understand that there's people connected to those animals and they want to help those people, too. If someone wants to help, what do they do? Just head to downtown Springfield, knock on the door and walk in, go online or both? Any of the above. Our website is a great source of information for volunteering, for ways to give, to learn about our programs and our impact. But also, I really do want to encourage people, come on down. We are open Tuesday through Saturday, 1230 to three. Our doors are wide open. Come visit, see the animals we have. Sometimes people say, I don't know if I go to the shelter. It's so sad. Dakin is not a sad place. Yes, sad things happen at Dakin and we and we and we have to help people through sad moments in their life. But we have just an incredible, wonderful staff, wonderful volunteers who want to open our doors, who want to show people the magic of everything we're doing at Dakin. And speaking of events, I do need to give a plug for our We'll Run for Cookies event, which is on May 9th and all the details. It's a 5K. So much fun. People do bring their animals and run with their pets or pictures of their animals on their shirts. It's a great day. So definitely visit the website to check out We'll Run for Cookies. There's one you do in the fall at Fort Hill Brewing. I totally drawn a blank on the name of it. Barks and Brews. That's usually in October as well. Yeah. So that's another terrific event. And so if people are looking to adopt, DakinHumane.org is the best place to go first because you mentioned it really is very early in this conversation. The pets are sort of coming and going, but the website is really the best resource to know what's available at that point. And you can start the application process on the website. If you find an animal on the website that you want to call up the staff and say, I want to put a hold on this dog or this cat, we're able to do that and arrange for a time in the next day or so for you to come down and do a meet. Sometimes dogs, for example, will need to meet another dog in the family. So we can also arrange for that. We've got space and staff that can help with that. So yes, absolutely. If you find an animal on the website, certainly call or send an email to us. And all that information is on our website, but also, you know, come on down. A lot of people think that they want to come in for a certain dog or cat, and then they meet another one that just catches their eye. So that's the pretty cool magic of that too. And you have the cat room, right? Which is behind this big glass wall. Oh yeah. We've got multiple cat rooms and certain, you mentioned kitten season, it'll start, it'll start happening in the spring and summer. Kittens are not coming at quite the rate that they do, but they're still coming in this time of year as well. But come spring and summer, we're going to have a large number of kittens coming in from the community that need homes. Meg, I can't thank you enough for joining me today, explaining how Dakin does what it does. Congratulations to you and your entire staff and all the volunteers for the great work you do for our pet community. Thank you. Thank you so much. We appreciate the support. This is 22 News In Focus with Patrick Berry.