Our Beginnings

The Shelter Friends’ Origin Story

It all started with one phone call in 2014. Rachel called Kimmy, a teacher who moonlights as a photographer, and woke me up. This is Kimmy’s side of the story:

Columbus Day, 2014:

Rachel: “Hey, friend! Can you give me some advice on how to photograph animals?”

Still half asleep and confused, I asked her what animals she was trying to photograph. “Shelter animals,” she said. Then Rachel said the worst thing I’ve ever heard:

“85% of the animals who come to Holbrook Animal Control shelter are euthanized.”

-Rachel Dorsey, future President of the Shelter Friends non-profit, reporting on the sad state of affairs in 2014.

Rachel was intent on changing that reality. I joined immediately. “I’m in,” I said. “Forget advice, I want to be part of the solution.”

We gathered up some pumpkins and flowers and made an “Adopt Me” sign and headed over to the animal shelter for a photoshoot with the animals at the shelter who turned out to be the sweetest of sweethearts.

Merrill Young, then Holbrook’s animal control officer, supported our photography session and efforts to increase adoptions at the shelter. He absolutely hated putting down animals — the worst part of his job, which ended up having a huge impact on his mental health — but was forced to do it every week to make space for the continuous flow of animals at our rural municipal shelter. By law, Holbrook’s shelter was required to take in any animals surrendered or found within city limits. Also, the City’s contract with Navajo County animal control meant additional impounded animals at Holbrook’s shelter, leading to consistent overcrowding at our small shelter.

With limited space — only 18 dog kennels, and 12 cat cages — and no way to advertise the shelter’s available animals, large volumes of adoptable pets were routinely killed to free up space for the endless flow of new, inbound strays and abandoned community pets.

This is where Rachel came up with a plan to advertise those animals, return them to their owners or get them adopted before their ‘time was up’ at Holbrook’s city pound. That sunny October day in 2014, we began something that, a year later, evolved into our wonderful nonprofit organization, the Friends of the Holbrook Animal Shelter. We photographed those adoptable pets, published their portraits in the local newspaper, and started gaining awareness in our community. Soon after we created a Facebook page, and today we boast thousands of followers and daily engagements on our posts – we have an army of loving volunteers and deep support, not just in our local community, but in our greater region and surrounding shelter and rescue partners across North America.

Our greatest lesson learned from those early days was that there just aren’t enough homes or potential adopters within our city limits or our surrounding towns. Our key to saving lives is our strong network of partners and rescues across the country, especially in our state, who can help transport our huge intake of animals to larger population centers or specialty rescues who can connect available pets with their potential adopters and forever homes.

As a non-profit, we are also able to procure grants to support the health, wellness, and enrichment of our shelter pets and our offerings at our physical shelter. We’ve extended our reach and benefits of grant programs to our local community pets and families in need as well.

I am so proud of the work we’ve done in the last 10+ years. We’ve saved countless lives together by partnering with the shelter, the City, our community, regional rescues and shelter groups, potential adopters across the country, but mostly all our wonderful and passionate volunteers and supporters in our community. I cannot thank you enough for the love you’ve shown us over these ten years. Keep sharing your love with us and with these sweet shelter friends.

With love,

Kimmy Jaster

In the early days of our non-profit, while Rachel led the strategy, and Kimmy led the marketing and photography efforts, we had other local heroes join our efforts:
– Sarah H. volunteered to be our rescue contact and treasurer,
– Dani C. stepped up to be our shelter liaison (and high-volume foster mama),
– Angela K. coordinated volunteer events and helped with grants.

As our all-female band of board volunteers led our shelter group through hard times, we gained footing in our community and attracted more help and more love and attention for our adoptable pets…we were able to achieve real results:

Our devastating 85% euthanasia rate in 2014
became our rallying cry to form this non-profit
and since then
we’ve achieved a full rate flip into LIVE OUTCOMES:
85% ADOPTION / RESCUE since 2017!