Petco Love Invests in Pima Animal Care Center
The Pima County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously on May 7 to accept a two-year, $300,000 grant from Petco Love to Pima Animal Care Center, which will use the funds in support of its life-saving work for animals in Pima County.
“This investment will quite literally help us save lives,” said Monica Dangler, PACC’s director of animal services. “We’ve put a great deal of resources into our adoptions and foster programs and see so many pets find wonderful new homes every day. However, we continue to see pets who we know have loving homes come into the shelter. We’re hoping that by utilizing these funds to expand our lost-and-found programming, we’ll be able to keep more pets with the families who love them.”
Petco Love is a national nonprofit leading change for pets by harnessing the power of love to make communities and pet families closer, stronger, and healthier, the organization said. Since its founding in 1999, Petco Love has invested nearly $400 million in adoption and other lifesaving efforts. Petco Love also helps find loving homes for pets in partnership with Petco and more than 4,000 organizations — like PACC — across North America, with 6.8 million pets adopted and counting.
“Our investment in Pima Animal Care Center is part of more than $15 million in investments recently announced by Petco Love to empower local organizations across the country as part of our commitment to create a future in which no pet is unnecessarily euthanized,” said Susanne Kogut, president of Petco Love. “Our local investments are only part of our strategy to empower animal lovers to drive lifesaving change right alongside us. We launched Petco Love Lost, a national lost and found database that uses patented image-recognition technology to simplify the search for lost pets.”
PACC will use the funds to help pet owners keep their pets, or if lost, reunite them. In particular, PACC plans to expand its marketing efforts regarding lost and found pets with an emphasis on promoting Petco Love Lost, which PACC began using as its lost-and-found reporting system in 2023.
PACC also will use the Petco Love grant to build a community lost and-found team that will educate pet owners and provide necessary supplies like microchips, collars, and tags in targeted zip codes that see high numbers of pets without homes. This team also will provide transportation to take lost pets back to their owners, as PACC data has shown that lack of transportation can present a barrier in getting pets reunited with their families.
