Paw Works Aims to Help Animals Find Their Forever Home

If you are looking to add a new fur baby to your family, Paw Works is here to help.

Established in 2014, Paw Works was founded with the clear mission to help make Ventura County, California “no kill.” Chad Atkins and Christina Morgan formed a rescue organization designed to place unwanted animals from county and city shelters into permanent homes. They both hoped to ease the tragic burden that is created when owners abandon their animals, and fail to spay or neuter their pets.

Less than a month after Paw Works was formed, Ventura Country was able to achieve “no kill” status through determination and support. Today, Paw Works takes in thousands of animals throughout California, and 98 percent of every donated dollar goes directly back to the rescue, care, education, and adoption of pets. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, Paw Works has experienced a 400 percent increased adoption rate while still taking in 30-50 animals per week.

Quickly gaining attention and popularity, Paw Works has been featured on Animal Planet, Discovery Channel, The Kelly Clarkson Show, Entertainment Tonight, and in several local and national news outlets. They also teamed up with Hallmark to produce two Tails of Joy episodes.

OUT FRONT had the opportunity to chat more with Atkins who also serves as the organization’s executive director.Hi, Chad! Thank you for taking some time to chat with me about Paw Works. Can you begin by telling us more about the organization and how it began?
Paw Works is a nonprofit animal rescue that started on January 17, 2014. We started with the intention of making Ventura County no kill, and that means that 90 percent of the animals in your county get out alive through either rescue, adoption, or return to their owners. When we started in the middle of January, we actually helped our county shelter become no kill for the very first time within the first 30 days, and that was purely through pulling enough animals through and helping them create programs that they could get enrichment and helping them increase their adoption rate. Since that time, they have stayed no kill. We dedicated our first year helping them stay that way, and now they have done it on their own. By just implementing enough programs, and basically as a rescue, we kind of took the relief valve and released the pressure that they had from all the animals coming in. Since that time, we have now expanded all over California, and even reached out to Louisiana, which is part of the Tails of Joy show that we produce.

Why did you want to help start Paw Works?
Back in 2013, Christina was actually a client of mine for about 10 years, I ran a doggy daycare and service that I began in San Francisco. Then I moved out here to Ventura County, and I helped her kind of socialize her dog. At that time, she was working with another nonprofit, a very small one in the same area. She asked me to come and assist her because I had done such a great job with her dog and socializing it, she thought maybe I could help some of the larger breed dogs that were not getting out. I told her okay, I’ll come, and I’ll dedicate around five hours a week of my time to assist. I have always been the type of guy that just goes off my gut and heart, and something told me to do this. I have rescued all my life. However, I have never been a part of rescue prior to this.

The first week, I volunteered 40 hours that week. I realized very quickly that I could not just volunteer for five hours a week. I never felt like I could do enough. There was always another animal to help, but there was never enough time in the day. As time progressed, I started to see my business suffer. I told her that unfortunately, I would not be able to continue forth and assist the rescue because it was taking too much time, and I did not have the mentality to be able to do just a little and then walk away. It hurt too much. So, she actually talked me into applying for a job there that wasn’t even created. I thought there was no way that they would hire me. So, I said sure, I will put together a proposal. I did, and they hired me.

At the time, she was the executive director of that organization, and I became the shelter manager. From there, I lasted about three months. With any nonprofit, there is a Board of Directors, and even though we were successful in our efforts of raising money, where we were at was a very low-income area. We got a lot more animals out, and our social media presence increased. There was inner conflict with the Board of Directors, and in December 2013, they said they could no longer afford my salary. With that, I had a thirst for helping animals. I thought with the knowledge that I got from the few months that I worked at the shelter, I could actually assist bigger and better. So, I suggested to Christina that we start Paw Works, and we did.

Animal rescue has always been a passion of yours?
I would say animals have always been a passion of mine. Animal rescue has developed into a passion. I have always been good at business, and I never wanted to work for anybody but myself. Animals also don’t talk back. I really get a self-satisfaction out of helping animals.

How many animals would you say Paw Works takes in on a weekly basis?
On a weekly basis, probably 45-60. We are rescuing about 2,500 a year now. Especially with the pandemic occurring. Last year, we rescued about 1,640. This year we are on track to 2,500.How many animals are adopted and find their new forever home within a year?
I would say about 90 percent. The other ones either stay in foster or stay with us until they find their forever homes.

Does Paw Works only take in cats and dogs, or all different kind of animals?
For the first year, we only rescued dogs. Then in 2015, we started rescuing cats as well. There are not a lot of rescues out there that rescue both. They either do one or the other. Fortunately, we have two adoption centers at two high end malls in Ventura County, so we had the foot traffic and felt that felines were underseen. So, we started rescuing cats as well in 2015.

Related Article: Apple to Debut Transgender Pride Flag Emoji

What should one know before fostering or adopting a pet?
One should know their lifestyle and themselves. Animals are not there to fill a void, necessarily. They are there to add value, but not necessarily feel something. If you tend to be somebody who is less active, understanding what your personal needs are will be very helpful in choosing the right animal for yourself.

Like you said, Paw Works has expanded throughout California, and you traveled to Louisiana. Do you hope to expand even more?
Paw Works will be a national organization. That is my goal. We are only six-years-old, and we already feel like we have made quite a name for ourselves. We do quite a bit of stuff in media just to share the message of adopt, don’t shop, and that rescue animals are not second-class citizens. They all deserve the opportunity to find their forever homes. My goal is to kind of be the end all for pet overpopulation and be a national organization.

What LGBTQ organizations has Paw Works paired up with for events?
We have worked with We Are Channel Q, and we have done stuff at The Abbey. We have several celebrities like Jai Rodriguez and Mikalah Gordon we have done stuff with. Sarah Paulson has adopted from us.Do you have a large list of celebrity clientele?
Yes. Kaley Cuoco has adopted from us, Mena Massoud who was Aladdin in the live action film, Paxton Booth, Laurie Mecalf, Zoe Perry, Karamo Brown. We come on a lot of these shows, and we tend to rescue a lot of pregnant dogs. A lot of puppies that don’t always make it out. People think that puppies are always going to make it out of the shelter, but unfortunately, they don’t. When a puppy doesn’t have a mom and it needs to be bottle fed, it is very inhumane to leave them in a cold shelter. Being that we are a nonprofit, we have access to a lot of fosters. We get a lot of these animals, and then it is a great, feel good moment on a show to have puppies, so we come in contact with a lot of celebrities.

Which shows and networks have you made appearances on?
We work a lot with Discovery Channel and Animal Planet. We usually do Puppy Bowl every October. Most people don’t realize this, but it is pre-filmed. It is not filmed the day of. Normally we fly to New York and film that, and it is great exposure for Paw Works. However, this year because of COVID, we are not going to fly to New York, but we did shoot a segment with them for Puppy Bowl, and it is a cross promotion between Food Network. We also do The Kelly Clarkson Show, KTLA, we did a cross promotion with Discovery and David Dobrik. We went to his house for his new show Dodgeball Thunderdome. We do CBS, Spectrum News, and we do puppy parties. Puppies are so easy to adopt. Everybody loves puppy breath and puppy paws and just having that moment to snuggle with a puppy. There is nothing more fun.

Related Article: Ramon Caballero: Art and Significance

Can you tell us more about teaming up with Hallmark for the Tails of Joy specials?
Yes, there are two of them. Tails of Joy 1 which followed Paw Works solely. It followed our transport of 60 animals from the Central Valley. The most recent one, Tails of Joy 2, featured Paw Works and eight other rescues, seven from Michigan and one from Florida, and we also teamed up with BISSELL Pet Foundation. Tails of Joy was created by myself and Kristi Foley from Pleasant Street Entertainment, and it was greenlit by Hallmark to have these two episodes. We always hope for more because we get to share our stories.

What we ended up doing was going out to Louisiana. A lot of the area in Louisiana is very destitute, so it’s Opelousas, Louisiana, and the shelter there is called St. Landry Parish. They pretty much have zero foot traffic, it is very low-income, and people don’t have access to general health care and sometimes food on the table. So, animals run on the streets, and their intake is about 5,000 a year. Without rescue organizations going in there and pulling animals, most of them would be euthanized. St. Landry’s was created to be a youth innovation center. Through the executive director that was there at the time, Stacey Alleman, she began reaching out to many different rescues and created a huge network.

For Tails of Joy 2, we rescued 200 dogs and one cat on that transport between the nine rescues. I had a team that drove back from Opelousas all the way back to California. It took about three days and sleeping in the car. When we got them back, most of the animals in Louisiana and the south are heartworm positive, and that can be deadly and shorten their lives. To this day, we are still in the process of getting a handful of those heartworms out, but to my knowledge, all the dogs and the one cat have been adopted.What have been some of the challenges of operating Paw Works during COVID?
Honestly, it has been a good-bad problem to have. What I mean by that is, logistically, we had to realize how to do business again. Luckily, I am very quick on my feet, and I think outside the box. I am not stuck to a certain way of doing business. When we closed our adoption centers on March 19, we quickly gutted them because we adopt out the animals, but it is also a boutique. I like to say we had the concept of the Vanderpump Dogs, the boutique type style. We ended up gutting our old storefronts and creating a mobile boutique at our facility which is not normally open to the public. From there, we created an outside adoption event every weekend, and we have been doing anywhere from 50-100 adoptions every weekend.

Besides figuring out those logistics, we had to figure out how to continually save animals while social distancing and following proper COVID protocol rules. We appreciate people’s patience because we were not answering our phones at the storefront, and we have not been answering all our emails because that is pretty much what I would be doing all day. We are out there saving lives and getting them adopted. People are being patient, understanding, and coming to our adoption events. I would say it has been one of the most challenging for people, not necessarily for ourselves. There is a reason we work with animals. We are good with animals. Our people skills sometimes can be challenging, but when people are patient, we’re patient. Overall, we are looking to help more animals.

For more information and to stay up-to-date, follow Paw Works on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. Also, make sure to check out their official website, pawworks.org.

Photos Courtesy of Paw Works and Alexx Henry