For Anne Richey, Chief Financial Officer at Iris Domestic Violence Center, creating a pet-friendly shelter has been a top priority from the moment she began working there. As a self-proclaimed “pet person”, Anne understands just how important the human-animal bond is, especially when considering its importance in a survivor’s ability to heal. “How can you not want to do everything you can to help pets and keep them with their families?” Anne asks.
Iris, a Louisiana-based nonprofit domestic violence service organization, helps survivors from eight parishes in the Baton Rouge area. With a mission to “empower survivors, prevent relationship violence, and promote justice for victims of domestic and dating violence, their children, and our communities” they strive to provide all-encompassing services for each client that enters through their doors.
“I hope that is what this program allows, domestic violence survivors getting to keep their pets and pets getting to keep their people.”
They provide a variety of services, including crisis intervention, counseling, legal advocacy, community outreach, and housing. With more than 40 years in service, Iris’s safe house sheltering services house over 500 people each year. In November, they were able to expand those services to include pets! Greater Good Charities completed a shelter renovation that now allows clients to bring their animal companions when seeking safe shelter. “I hope that is what this program allows, domestic violence survivors getting to keep their pets and pets getting to keep their people,” Anne told us.
The renovation project was a collaboration between Greater Good Charities, RedRover, and local Baton Rouge volunteers.
Pet-friendly renovations included:
- Two “catios”
- Six indoor and outdoor chain-link dog runs
- Two dog play yards
- Outdoor grooming area
- Pet enrichment added to bedrooms, such as cat cubbies and shelves
- Additional storage space for pet materials
This project has been two years in the making. Anne initiated the program planning process after hearing RedRover’s President and CEO, Katie Campbell, speak at the National Organization for Victim Advocacy Annual Training Event in Denver, Colorado, in 2022. From that moment on she started learning everything she could about pet housing programs. She utilized Don’t Forget the Pets’ many resources, noting the crucial role they played in the project’s success. “Had they not been available to me, I don’t know if I would be where I am now. Transitioning to this new program would be more bumpy,” she says.
Pictured: Staff dog, Finn, explores one of Iris’s new dog runs.
Anne knew there was no need to “recreate the wheel”. Instead, she leaned on existing knowledge from experts in the field. She watched webinars, read articles, studied the Don’t Forget the Pets Training Handbook, and joined the Coaching Program. Anne says, “It’s all about sharing information. There’s been so many people who have done this before me and we can learn from their mistakes. This saves us so much time not working from scratch.” She strongly recommended Don’t Forget the Pets’ guest presentations, highlighting how the different viewpoints shared in each presentation are still relevant no matter what sector you work in, “we all deal with the same problems and struggles,” she adds.
When asked what their biggest challenge was, Anne pointed to funding and the planning required to keep pets safe and contained. “The campus is big at this shelter, but the real logistics of being able to keep the animals separate from clients who were allergic or afraid was the biggest concern. People are already in emergency shelter, so we don’t want to make it more stressful.”
While some shelters struggle to find pet-inclusive insurance coverage, this wasn’t the case for Iris. Anne says, “We reached out to our broker first thing and told them, ‘This is what we want to do. What will this do to our rate?’ They told us no change at all! The only thing they asked for was a liability waiver.” Anne noted how important it is to work with your insurance company as soon as you can because “it could’ve stopped everything before it starts.” “He [the insurance broker] is not in the domestic violence world or communal living, so he had questions, and conversations were held. Thankfully, the initial response wasn’t a no.”
Pictured: A Greater Good Charities volunteer installs chain link fencing.
“We are so happy to have an animal welfare partner to be able to lean on.”
Once Iris had their plan in place, policies and procedures created, and support from both the board and staff, they could move forward with pushing their pet program to the next level. This included applying for and being awarded a RedRover Safe Housing grant. They were excited to partner with a local Baton Rouge animal shelter, Companion Animal Alliance, who will assist them with veterinary care and secondary animal housing services. Anne shared that it was Companion Animal Alliance that reached out to Iris first, to ensure that they were providing community services that included the pets of people in crisis. “We are so happy to have an animal welfare partner to be able to lean on,” she says.
Finally, Anne received a message from Greater Good Charities asking if they would be interested in having the team come down to Baton Rouge to do the pet-friendly renovations for Iris. “The stars aligned,“ says Anne. “It was meant to be.”
What’s on the horizon for Iris? Anne is already looking to the future. “Affordable housing that accepts pets is the next step for us,” she says. It’s one battle to provide emergency housing services for survivors with pets, but when clients are ready to transition out of the shelter, finding pet-friendly rental housing can be incredibly difficult. But this is an area that is extremely important to Anne. “If you don’t experience that bond with a pet then you might not realize that it isn’t a one-way experience. Pets have attachments just like we do. I could not imagine not being able to move with my pets.”
Thanks to Anne and the dedicated team at Iris Domestic Violence Center, many survivors across Louisiana will not have to make the impossible choice between seeking safety from abuse and keeping a beloved pet.
Are you interested in making your domestic violence or homeless shelter pet friendly? We’re here to help! Contact us at DFTP@greatergood.org.
Ketia Johnson is a Community Outreach Coordinator with RedRover. Prior to joining the Don’t Forget the Pets team, she earned her Master’s degree in Anthrozoology from Canisius College and spent over 8 years working in veterinary medicine at animal shelters.
