Since coming on as executive director in 2020, the Ashtabula County Animal Protective League (ACAPL) has undergone significant positive transformations, both with regard to our service model and with our infrastructure and organizational capacity. Among these changes are the establishment of an in-house veterinary team that can spay and neuter animals and conduct health exams prior to adoption. We have also established SOPs for every area of our facilities to ensure staff alignment and the maximization of internal resources. Redundancies have been inserted into our workflow to prevent mistakes from happening, which has saved us both time and money. Furthermore, a “Golden Years” medical and senior adoption program was set up to provide free adoption for animals with chronic medical issues and our "Rodent Rangers" rehomes 'spicy kitties' into working environments. We’ve reconfigured our internal and external spaces to meet the ever changing needs of our population, including a new 'pocket pets' adoption area and kitten triage nursery. Our live release rate continues to improve every year and our volunteer and foster program are thriving.
I've continued to build programs and find ways to uniquely address our community needs. We have taken on community spay/neuter programming, yielding 1500+ surgeries each year, taken on humane education and agency for the county and developed a pet food pantry to help animals shelter in place.
