April 1, 2025 • 45 mins
What if feeding your pet meant you had to skip dinner yourself?
For thousands of families, that’s not a hypothetical—it’s a heartbreaking daily decision. And when the bills pile up, surrendering a beloved pet can feel like the only option left.
In this episode, I talk with Stacey LeBaron, founder of PAWSitive Pantry and host of The Community Cats Podcast, about how her team is tackling pet food insecurity and keeping pets in the homes where they’re loved. From distributing more than 140,000 pounds of food each year to partnering with shelters and food banks, Stacey shares exactly how they’re doing it—and how you can help too.
BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU’LL DISCOVER:
- The root causes of pet surrenders and how access to food can change everything
- How one nonprofit built a scalable model to distribute massive amounts of pet food
- Practical steps you can take in your own community to support pets and their people
This episode is proof that solving big problems doesn’t always require big budgets—it starts with people who care and take action. Whether you’re in rescue, animal welfare, or just want to help, this conversation will leave you inspired and equipped.
When you finish listening, I'd love to hear your biggest takeaway from today’s episode.
Take a screenshot of you listening on your device, share it to your Instagram stories, and tag me [@YourSocialHandle]!
While you’re there, follow me for more behind-the-scenes stories, practical pet care tips, and ways to create real change in your rescue, your home, and your community.
CONNECT WITH STACEY LeBARON:
Instagram | pawsitivepantry.org
LEARN MORE FROM AMY CASTRO:
Instagram | [YourWebsite.com]
OTHER LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
- Pet Food Assistance Directory
- The Community Cats Podcast
- Merrimack River Feline Rescue Society
- Community Cat Pyramid & Calculator
- Animal Policy Group
- Mel Robbins' Let Them Theory
Love the show? Please share it with another pet parent who wants less chaos and more clarity. Please leave a 5-star review to help others find real-life, judgment-free advice.
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Big pet challenges we help pet parents solve include: puppy training, cat behavior, pet budgeting, stress-free vet visits, solutions for multi-pet households, and more.
Contact: Amy@muddypawsandhairballs.com
©Ⓟ 2025 by Amy Castro.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Amy Castro (00:00):
What if feeding your pet meant skipping meals
yourself?
Unfortunately, it's aheartbreaking reality for
countless pet owners.
Yet pet food insecurity is anissue that rarely gets the
attention it deserves.
Every day, people worldwidemake impossible choices Do they
pay the rent, do they buy theirgroceries or do they ensure that
their beloved pet doesn't gohungry.
But one organization isstepping in to change the game,
(00:23):
ensuring that no one has tochoose between feeding
themselves and feeding theirpets.
Stick around, because thisconversation is going to
challenge what you think youknow about pet welfare and what
it really takes to keep pets andtheir people together.
Welcome to Muddy Paws andHairballs, the podcast that cuts
through the fluff to talk aboutreal life of pet parents.
(00:44):
I'm Amy Castro, and today we'rediving into the issue of pet
food insecurity, a problem thataffects more families than you
probably think.
My guest today is StaceyLeBaron, a powerhouse in the
animal welfare world with morethan 30 years of experience
tackling cat overpopulation andpet welfare issues.
She's the founder and host ofthe Community Cats podcast,
(01:05):
where she has recorded more than600 episodes interviewing
experts from around the world.
She's also the president ofPositive Pantry, a nonprofit
working to ensure pets stay intheir homes by providing food to
families in need.
Today, we're going to talkabout the challenges of running
a pet food bank and how we canall be part of the solution.
(01:26):
So, stacey, welcome to the show.
Oh, thank you so much forhaving me, amy, awesome.
Well, you're even a moreexperienced podcaster than I am,
so I'm excited to have thisconversation.
But I know, as we were talkingbefore we started the recording,
that I think there's a lot ofoverlap in our experiences, but
you've just kind of likeexponentially done things on a
bigger scale.
So what inspired the PositivePantry?
Stacy LeBaron (01:48):
It was founded by Jen Bennett around.
I don't know if we remember wayback when to 2008 and 2009,
when we had another financialcrisis and people were
struggling to make ends meet,housing was an issue A lot of
people were underwater on theirmortgages and that kind of thing
and Jen Bennett, in that periodof time, up here in Warren,
(02:11):
vermont, we were in a littlearea called the Mad River Valley
, so Sugarbush, mad River Glenski area, and she started this
small group to focus on tryingto provide pet food to the
families in the Mad River Valleyduring this very challenging
period of time, and so she wasthe chief canine officer of the
(02:33):
Positive Pantry and so theystarted out with dog food and
cat food and they would get agroup of volunteers together.
They'd break bags down and theyhad like 10, we call them food
shelves in Vermont, so they'resmall food shelves and they're
open like two or three days aweek for a couple of hours and
they would deliver pet food tothese food shelves.
So about 10 of them.
So very, very small effort andit was very labor intensive.
(02:55):
You're buying food, you'rebreaking it down, you're zipping
up, you're doing all the bagsand you're labeling the bags
dating them, and I moved toVermont in around 2013.
It's about five years later Metup with Pazza Pantry.
At that point in time I hadstepped away from the day-to-day
animal welfare space and I wastaking care of my mom, who had
severe dementia at the time.
And so I realized, as you know,can't be all things to all
(03:19):
people and at that point in timeI really needed to make myself
available to my mom.
But I was like, well, pet food,how hard could that be, you
know.
And so keep me sort of ourboard.
So I became the chief felineofficer and her vice president
for several years, and then,about four or five years ago, we
(03:51):
flipped, and so she's our vicepresident and I'm now president
of Positive Pantry.
And the big thing that happenedfor our organization was about
eight or nine years ago.
We merged well, we collaboratewith the Vermont, the Greater
Vermont Food Bank.
So we now have we're nowstatewide and we cover the whole
state and we help facilitatemaking connections and
(04:14):
supporting the whole state ofVermont.
And then, of more recent time,after COVID, we merged with a
subcommittee or a pilot groupcalled the Pet Food Task Force,
and now we also coverMassachusetts.
So the why was.
I just felt like it wassomething for me to be involved
with, but I was, like you know,pet food so much easier than the
whole animal thing.
And then, of course, as withmany of us on our journey, it's
(04:37):
like, well, this happens, andthen this happens, and this
happens, and so it grows, andgrows, and grows and becomes a
great opportunity and it'sreally, it's a wonderful program
.
We just love to be able toprovide pet food to families in
need.
Amy Castro (04:49):
So is it something where you're really seeing these
ups and downs based on a directconnection to the economy, or
have things been pretty steady,or have they kind of been on the
rise?
Because I think the whole ideaof pet food insecurity is
probably not something that alot of people think about unless
they have the issue right Welland it's funny.
Stacy LeBaron (05:08):
So we try to define the issue too.
So there's veterinaryinsecurity and there's pet food
insecurity.
So most people can't afford a$400 vet bill.
So if their cat gets sick ortheir dog gets injured, runs
outside, eats something itshouldn't eat, most people have
a really hard time of evenaffording that veterinary visit,
(05:29):
and so we're also greatsupporters of if you can utilize
some of the pet food resources.
Please take advantage of thatand then put that money aside
that you would have paid to buythe food and put your little
coffee can I guess we don't docoffee cans anymore, but you
know we have your little savingsmechanism there to save the
(05:49):
money for that vet bill that youmay need down the line, because
the affordability in veterinarycare is just so challenging
right now for families also, andso it's trying to utilize
multiple levers to be able toput a patchwork together to help
families be able to keep theirpets, and so if, through taking
advantage of some of theseopportunities can help save some
(06:11):
money for folks to be able toafford the veterinary care that
they need for their pets, to youknow that all makes sense.
So we're not necessarily superreactive.
We're more of a like a steadyof supply.
However, I will say, duringCOVID the demands and need went
like through the roof, and itwas.
It was way up there, but thenthe donations were also way up
(06:34):
there too.
So and now we've kind of comeback down and we're more at a
like a pre COVID sort of steadylevel, and so that's that's been
better.
Amy Castro (06:43):
As a president of a nonprofit organization who has
to budget, this is more helpfulfor us and they say they're
looking to surrender a pet, myfirst question is always why,
versus saying yes, we can takeit, no, we can't, because we do
help with medical care, like wehad.
(07:11):
One of our kind of happieststories was a situation that was
a dog that had happy tail andthey kept smashing its tail open
and throwing blood all over thehouse.
So it got moved to livingoutside.
But the people couldn't affordthe surgery to fix the issue and
so they were looking tosurrender the dog and we
fundraised pretty quickly toraise the money for that surgery
.
But I've never really thoughtabout asking if we were able to
(07:32):
provide this, then how wouldthat help out?
But I think it's something foranimal welfare organizations and
for consumers or pet parents tothink about.
Don't get so focused on the vetbill.
Get focused on where could thatmoney come from otherwise or
how can I make up the difference, kind of thing.
So that's such a good point.
Stacy LeBaron (07:53):
And some veterinarians will have a
payment plan system or an option.
But then you say, oh, if I canprovide you $100, $200, whatever
of pet food and supplies permonth, then then you can move
that into your payment planmonth, then you can move that
into your payment plan.
And so there are just a lot ofdifferent ways to try and help
folks be able to make ends meetreally, and that's part of what
(08:13):
we are all about, and wecertainly we focus on the pet
food, but, as you've said, we'reall connected in this animal
welfare space and the more wecan collaborate, the better off
we're all going to be.
And so if I can learn as muchas I can about other programs to
share with others, I'm going todo that.
Amy Castro (08:29):
Yeah, that's a good point.
When people are looking tosurrender, the initial contact
is always about surrender, notabout how can you help me, or
can you give me the money tohelp for this surgery, or can
you pay for it, can you offsetit, can you help me fundraise?
Whatever it might be, and thoseare usually solutions we have
to present.
I mean, do you see that peopleare ashamed, embarrassed,
whatever words?
You want to fill in the blank,to ask for that help or to come
(08:51):
and use the pantry?
Stacy LeBaron (08:58):
even if their pet really needs it Right.
The way we work in most casesis we're providing the pet food
to a human food shelf, so we'renot necessarily touching the
people individually unless theycontact us via email or we're
doing a pop-up.
Sometimes we do some pop-upevents also and we do
fundraisers and outreach, andyou know, the people that we
deal with at Positive Pantry arealready thinking about how can
they band-aid the situationtogether.
(09:20):
So luckily we don't get thequestion of how can I surrender
my animal?
They're approaching us.
How can you help me be able tokeep my dog and my cat, even
though I've hit upon a hard timeand that kind of thing?
So luckily we don't have thelook of a rescue or a shelter,
so that conversation doesn'thappen.
(09:40):
I think when the phone callscome to a rescue or a shelter, I
think that the biases that'sall that they provide are those
services, and so I mean I, likeyou, would do a flip on it and
when somebody calls, I would saytell me what's going on in your
life and why is this happening,and you know what can we do to
partner together to enable youto continue to keep your pet.
(10:02):
So it's challenging, though,because I do think that the
general public has certainmindset of like I must give it
up because I can't afford it, orpeople think I should be able
to do this for my pet and thatkind of thing, and I just hope
that we can all just open up theconversation and just be open
and have just listening.
(10:23):
We need to listen a little bitbetter and I think we'd be much
more successful.
Amy Castro (10:27):
Yeah, that's, and that was actually where I was
going to go next with this,because you got me thinking
about the fact that when youthink about and I'm sure you see
the same kinds of posts that Isee you know somebody goes out
to their neighborhood Facebookgroup or to an animal rescue
group or whatever it might be,and they post something about
needing to rehome a pet, andimmediately there's this
backlash of I would never giveup my pet, even if I was moving
(10:50):
to the moon, I would buy aspaceship for my.
I mean, you know, justbasically beating that person
over the head for consideringgiving up their pet.
And then there's the wholeviewpoint of you know, if you
can't afford to feed your pet,then you probably shouldn't have
one.
And that comes from rescuepeople.
It comes from, you know, laypeople.
What are your thoughts on thatsubject?
(11:10):
The whole financial elementwhen we go out to adopt a pet is
something that we think aboutwhen we come from rescue,
because we want that animal tobe able to stay with that person
long term.
Stacy LeBaron (11:21):
Oh yeah, and you know it's a very case by case
basis with regards to people,some, some folk, their stress
levels.
So you know, if I was stressed,you know I didn't know where I
was going to get food for myfamily or for my pets.
I don't know how I would be.
(11:41):
But you know we have supportedfolks that are living in their
cars with their kids and theirpets because they don't want to
go to a homeless shelter,because they don't want to give
up their pets and they can makeit work.
They make it work and I meanI've had folks deliver pet food
to folks in their cars and it'slike you know, and the response
(12:13):
is, like you know, it's not thatbad.
So if it's temporary, I guess,if it becomes systemic and maybe
you see behavioral issues,anything that's causing harm to
the family, you know maybethat's a time to have to make
some decisions.
But it's about availing peopleof choices and to have those
choices and to feel like there'songoing support.
The one thing we try to be isvery clear with folks that we
will support with food for aperiod of time with individuals,
but we won't be lifelongsupporters.
(12:34):
So folks need to kind of thinkabout what they're gonna do
after a six month period of time.
Is there another resource?
We don't want them to becomesuper dependent on us because we
wanna be able to help others,but we also have a desire to not
like be like this is going tohelp you for seven days, because
I don't think you can solve anissue that might be happening in
(12:55):
your family in seven days.
But, like, six months is aboutour window where we start having
conversations at four to fivemonths and saying you know, do
you have a plan in place forsome more opportunity for your
animals?
And that kind of thing.
Deciding to surrender your petis a very personal decision and
it's one that you and I cannotmake for anybody else.
Amy Castro (13:14):
Yeah, that's so true , but yet people like to try to
think that they have the rightto express that opinion, which
is a shame, because what that?
I think what that does is itdrives people underground.
So, ok, fine, I'm going out tothis Facebook group, let's say,
or whatever social mediaplatform, and I'm asking for
help in rehoming my pet, andthen I get crucified and so,
(13:35):
therefore, I just dump my pet orI take it to a kill shelter or
whatever the case may be,because I don't want to face
that again.
I mean, people aren't going toput their hand on the stove more
than once before they learnthat lesson, and it's
unfortunate that people feellike they need to respond like
that.
So how does it?
What are the logistics of howthe pantry works?
Like, do people donate moneyand then you use that to buy pet
(13:56):
food?
Do you have people that arebringing bags of pet food and I
know you kind of talked a littlebit about the distribution
process, but how does that work?
Stacy LeBaron (14:05):
Yeah.
So I will talk about Vermontand I'll talk about
Massachusetts, because we're twovery different models.
So if you are out there andyou're interested in starting a
pet food pantry, I'm going toshare both models so that then
you can say oh, I think thiswould work in my area and this
would work in my area.
In Vermont we collaborate withthe Vermont Food Bank and we
have luckily been able to getthem connected in with a program
(14:27):
through Feeding America, whichhas had a large grant from
PetSmart Charities for pet food,and so they're able to put
their name in the hat and askfor large donations through that
.
That's helped basically fueltheir distribution system.
So thank you, thank you toPetSmart Charities for making
this program happen.
It's about 140,000 pounds ofpet food has come through them,
(14:50):
like in 2024.
So we couldn't do what we'redoing without that opportunity.
We've also had someopportunities through Greater
Good.
Basically, they enabled us totake in donations to a warehouse
that we as a smallvolunteer-based organization, we
just didn't have the capabilityto do that.
So they do all that heavylifting, literally, of bringing
(15:13):
the product in and getting itdistributed.
I'm also on the board of theVermont Humane Federation and so
many of those animal sheltershave pet pantries and we've
helped to support them in theirneeds when they're reaching out
to the community with regards totheir pet food needs.
So we try to make sure we'realways filling the gaps too, as
well as helping individuals.
(15:34):
And then if and local foodshelves get their food through
the Vermont Food Bank, but iffor some reason they run out of
food and they're betweendeliveries or whatever, we'll
bridge the gap also on that onetoo.
So we're just always trying tolook at different ways of being
able to help support.
We do fundraising.
We fundraise a lot through ourwebsite.
(15:54):
We have a holiday appeal thatwe do.
We do a lot of grant writing,because I think grant
organizations and donor advisedfunds can understand more of the
strategic picture that this isgoing to cover the whole state.
So if there's like acorporation that wants to cover
the whole state, we're prettyeasy way to cover pet food needs
all across the state, becausethat's our focus In
Massachusetts.
We do not have like an anchororganization that we collaborate
(16:18):
with, so we're a dating servicebetween retailers, food shelves
and then with our volunteers.
So like we'll have volunteersgo to retailers and say you know
, can you do a food drive, doyou get broken bags and they
create these connections andthen they'll get that food and
then they bring it over to thelocal food pantry that's willing
to include pet food and theybring it over there or they'll
(16:40):
do a pop-up in the parking lotof the human food pantry days
and they'll provide pet foodthere.
So we're always just trying tokind of that's.
We have to be creative inMassachusetts about.
You know how to think outsideof the box and then we'll
purchase food.
Through the grant money that weget and the donations we get.
We'll purchase again to bridgethe gap and make sure everybody
(17:00):
has enough volume.
We probably significantly andconsistently support about 50
food shelves all across thestate.
We have about 35 volunteers inMassachusetts and then we also
do help with the animal shelterstoo that have food pantries.
So again, you know, and we werelike Greenfield College had a,
which is a commuter college inwestern Massachusetts, and they
(17:25):
had started a food shelf or foodpantry, you know, for human
food.
But they were getting so manyrequests for pet food that we've
added pet food in there at theschool-run food shelf.
So we're pretty much anybodywho reaches out and asks us, we
try to figure something out.
Amy Castro (17:41):
So what do you find?
I mean, obviously that's two,like you said, two completely
different approaches, but yetthey're working.
What are the challenges?
You know if somebody's sittingout there thinking I could start
this on a smaller scale in mycommunity or grow it into a big
scale.
What are some of the biggestchallenges that you face?
Stacy LeBaron (17:57):
We are, at this point in time, quite focused on
staying all volunteer run and soI will be honest and say we
have wonderful volunteers, wehave a great group, but we're
very vulnerable on a smallhandful of people.
You know we're dependent onthem, which you know.
There you are, amy, you'renodding away, which is like
(18:17):
we've seen many organizationswhere you know you've got three
to five sort of key players andlike if something happened to
two of them, you know theorganization would be very
challenged.
And so I mean maybe that's justwhat presidents are supposed to
do, is just worry about thatkind of thing all the time.
But that's just one thing thatI think about is, you know, if
something were to happen to thepresident and the treasurer and
(18:42):
you've met some of them onlineand they're really doing
wonderful work but it is a worryfor any small nonprofit being
so vulnerable because you'resuch a small group of people.
But if someone was just startingout, I would say stay small.
Start small with just one foodshelf.
Develop your system that wayand see what works and what
doesn't work, because thenyou'll get an understanding of
(19:05):
what you could then replicatefor other food shelves.
And in my world I do like thehaving one representative a
volunteer representative foreach food shelf.
So I do like that model wherehere in Vermont it's more like
they'll email me and we'llfacilitate virtually, but to
have a designated ambassador orrepresentative for each food
(19:26):
shelf, I think makes it feelmore local and more
community-based and whenopportunities become apparent
you can take advantage of themlocally.
I'm not local for most of theseplaces, but there's the Girl
Scouts and the Boy Scouts andlots of opportunities for
campaigns and awareness andoutreach, and so I do like the
model the small is beautifulmodel of having one person
(19:49):
designated in each community.
So I would start small, butthink about scale when you start
small.
Amy Castro (19:56):
Yeah, yeah, you got to have that bigger picture.
But I like what you said as faras having that kind of
continuity of the representative, because I think that person
can also better see the futureand see where potential problems
, roadblocks or whatevershortfalls, whatever it might be
, if they are consistentlyworking with that same group or
with that same organization orin that same facility.
(20:18):
So that's definitely goodadvice.
Stacy LeBaron (20:20):
Can I also?
I'd just like to also mentionquickly too, for folks that are
involved in the sort of thesenior center council and aging
Meals on Wheels space.
There's also funding for foodfor Meals on Wheels, national
funding.
I did a podcast with thecommunity, kat's podcast with
the folks from Meals on Wheels,and so, even if you aren't set
(20:44):
up or you don't think thatthat's something that you can do
, you could help facilitate byreaching out to your local Meals
on Wheels and introducing themto Morgan, who runs the national
group enabling pet food to getthrough to their clients.
So you know, a lot of it can beconnections.
It doesn't have to revolvearound money.
A lot of what we've done isconnections and opportunities,
(21:06):
Like, I say, the dating servicebetween the retailers and the
food shelves, and so bylistening to this podcast you'll
be like, oh, maybe I shouldtalk to my counsel on aging and
see if they've connected aboutthe pet food program from Meals
on Wheels, which also includesveterinary care too.
Amy Castro (21:23):
That's good to know.
I did not know that.
I mean, it makes sense.
The pet food thing totallymakes sense with Meals on Wheels
, but it's not something that Iwould have thought about.
Another thing I would add too,just because I know it does
exist in our local communityaround here is coordinating or
working with your local, city,county, municipal animal shelter
.
Not all of them are going to beopen to being involved in
(21:44):
something like that, but I doknow just one in particular
that's local, that actually hasa little pet food pantry.
It's somewhat unfortunatebecause it's for the community
and the community is arelatively affluent community.
But at the same time, thatconcept of if there's some space
where we could store somethingon site, or even asking for your
local animal control to be areferral source you know, if you
(22:07):
were just starting small andmaybe you were stockpiling a
little of this and a little ofthat on your own and your local
animal control could reach outand say, hey, you know, we had
contact with this person who ispossibly looking to surrender
their pet we couldn't take thepet, but they might need your
help and at least making themaware that you're trying to do
something you never know whatkind of support you might get
from that local facility.
(22:27):
So, as far as the long-termvision for Positive Pantry, do
you see it expanding to morestates or just growing within
the two states where you've gotit?
What's on the horizon?
Stacy LeBaron (22:40):
Wow, great question, Amy, and I'd love for
you to tell me what's our nextstep?
Amy Castro (22:44):
Don't tell me Please , I can barely keep up with what
I'm doing now, let alone bigpicture.
Stacy LeBaron (22:49):
I mean honestly, my big picture would be to cover
New England.
I think the square footage ofNew England is maybe less than
Texas, so we can do things in aregional way, you know, and so I
do think that we're closeenough together that we could
get some pretty significantresources.
(23:11):
I know with trucking to theNortheast, sometimes
organizations feel like it's notworth it because they're just
coming to one place and they'regoing back.
So if I had a regional grouping, you know if they're going to
stop in Vermont, New Hampshire,Maine, you know, maybe that
makes it worth the trip.
So I think, in terms of gettinglarge scale product into the
(23:32):
region, I think having it coverall of New England would be
ideal.
Amy Castro (23:36):
Yeah, that would be great.
It's funny you talk about thecloseness, because Texas it's
nothing.
I can't leave my house and notdrive an hour, let's just put it
this way.
I mean, I can get to the localgrocery store in 12 minutes, but
for the most part, you know,everything is about an hour away
and so I am moving back to theEast Coast, not to New England,
but you know, when people talkabout being able to traverse the
entire state of Delaware in anhour and a half north to south,
(23:59):
it's like mind boggling to me,like how much.
And I'm from New Yorkoriginally, so I know that drive
from New York to Maine and it'slike it's amazing how many
states you can pass through in arelatively small amount of time
.
And I still would have onlybeen north of Dallas.
It's all definitely relative.
Any success stories that standout to you?
Sometimes, whether it's rescueor whether it's doing what
(24:19):
you're doing, there are thoseincidences that just help you
keep going because you see it'sworth it.
Stacy LeBaron (24:29):
Yeah, and unfortunately I'm going to have
to go back into the COVID erathat we're trying not to
remember.
But I'm going to go back intoCOVID and this is how we got
started in Massachusetts.
So they're in Chelsea,massachusetts, which is a little
town north of Boston, highpopulation diversity and a lot
of population turnover in thatcommunity and we had a group I
(24:52):
was running a group there thatdid not get into the pet food
space and I always regrettedthat, and so I was like this is
an opportunity to try and startsomething.
And one of the churches, anEpiscopal church, st Luke's,
reached out to us and they saidyou know, we'd be happy to take
pet food.
They'd gone from assisting like90 families to over 300
families on a weekly basis withfood in general human food but
(25:15):
they were getting requests forpet food, and so we collaborated
with the MSPCA of Boston.
So we heard the story from thepastor there.
It was funny because he saidthey opened up at 10 am on
Saturday mornings for their fooddistribution days and they have
a camera outside their door andit's like at like six or seven
(25:35):
in the morning in the heat ofJuly anyway, there's like a fold
out beach chair there right bythe front door, and then there's
, like, this older gentlemanjust sitting there like reading
the paper and just doing histhing, but he wanted to be first
in line, first in line for thisthe food pantry and so and this
was every saturday, thishappened every saturday, but
(25:56):
they told us the story so itgets to be 10 am, they open the
door and he goes in and he goesstraight to the cat food table
and it was just for some reason,that simple act of like.
This man was willing to spendthree hours every morning
waiting in line, so he was thefirst one to the pet food table
because, unfortunately, the petfood table was the first place
(26:18):
to have the product go yeah andso he he wanted to make sure he
was going to take care of hiscats through this whole period
of time and that was what wasmost important to him and it
seems it seems like not valuable, but it's incredibly valuable
because, you know, here he justloves his cat and he's willing
(26:40):
to do this for his cat and Imean, it's one of many stories
like that, but that was the onethat happened kind of during
COVID and I'm like, okay, thisis my why.
You know what.
I'm doing this for him.
I'm doing it for this gentlemanand all the other people that
are out there.
Just this morning, I had anotherperson from Massachusetts who
was housebound and she wasrunning out of litter and cat
(27:01):
food and dog food and I puttogether a delivery for her.
She was like I can't tell youhow much this means to me.
You know, so many people turntheir back on you and you are
just wonderful, and I was likeI'm not wonderful, I'm just
doing my job, you know.
I'm like you know, and it'slike there's, as you said
earlier, there's no shame inthis.
There's absolutely no shame inthis.
We have so much technology, wecan figure things out.
(27:23):
We have so many more resources,we have delivery services.
Amy Castro (27:38):
We have food shelves , we have mobile, we have
shelters.
There are just so many deliverysystems that I think everybody
should be able to access foodand potentially some supplies if
they need to.
Possible pet surrender thatyou're not seeing.
You know what I mean.
It's like all the people whoare looking out for their pets
before they're looking out forthemselves, or they do that
until they can't do that anymorekind of thing, and it's like
you haven't seen the journeythat that person has traveled
(28:00):
when they get to that point topost on a social media platform
or to reach out to a rescue.
So how about we take a littlestep back and be a little less,
a little less judgy and a littlemore helpful when it comes to
people trying to do just doingtheir very best for their pet,
and that's what they know to do,yep, for sure?
Stacy LeBaron (28:17):
Yeah, there's a book out, actually by Mel
Robbins called Let them.
You know, it's very much aboutsort of being stoic and I feel
like I try to do that a lot,which is what is it that I can
impact and what can I help tosupport others?
But, as you say, I'm not goingto tell somebody what to do.
I'm going to provide themeducation, provide them
(28:39):
information.
I'm going to provide them myown personal beliefs.
I can agree to disagree withanybody any day of the week, but
I also will respect them.
I mean, I have difficultconversations, probably on a
daily basis, and I'm comfortablewith that and I think we should
all be comfortable with it.
And then we also need to takethe time and the space to let it
digest and to say did I learnsomething new today?
(29:01):
Or maybe that's not for me andI'm going to go my way.
So we have to realize we cancontrol our own words, our own
actions, our own physical space.
We may not have control overothers and I don't think we
should ask others that we shouldhave control over them.
Amy Castro (29:19):
I agree.
I agree.
That's such a good point.
So if somebody is listening tothis right now and they want to
get involved and they want tohelp, obviously if they're in
Vermont or Massachusetts thereare options available that might
not be available if somebody'ssomewhere else in the world.
So could you kind of hit bothof those.
Like if somebody was looking toget involved and they lived in
the states that you serve, wheredo they go to get started?
Stacy LeBaron (29:42):
Sure, so obviously, as you just said, in
Massachusetts or Vermont, please, please, go to
positivepantryorg and it's P-A-Wpositivepantryorg and we have a
nice website there and you canfill out a form for being a
volunteer and all that kind ofstuff.
So we'd love to have volunteers, virtual volunteers, if you
(30:03):
want to do anything like socialmedia, grant writing, virtual
connections, emailing, checkingin with the various food shelves
and our collaborative partners.
So there are alwaysopportunities for folks that are
outside of the region too.
We like to be as inclusive aspossible.
And then also, if you're inother parts and you want to be
very hands-on and bedistributing food in your own
(30:25):
community, which I highlyrecommend, there are other
organizations.
If you just Google pet foodpantries in my area, I believe
there is actually a pet foodpantry directory of some
national organizations.
It may be linked to theColorado Pet Food Pantry, which
I also look at as a modelorganization for a statewide
(30:45):
initiative for pet fooddistribution.
So Colorado may be a state youwant to also take a look at if
you're looking at trying to setsomething up in your own area,
and it's definitely check withyour local shelter.
Oftentimes they'll be like ohyeah, we have, we get pet food,
we give it away.
And it's like very, all randomand like you'd be like, well,
you're looking for a coordinator, I could do it.
(31:05):
Right, I could, you know, letme see, cause you can do an
awful lot with the closet.
You really can do an awful lotwith the closet if it's, if it's
organized well and it's spacedout right and you communicate it
so they may welcome you in tohelp run a pet food pantry
within their own organization.
Because it's just, it's one ofthose things everybody's
overwhelmed and it's like, ohgosh, it's another thing I have
(31:26):
to deal with, right?
But if somebody comes in says,hey, I'd really be interested in
taking on this initiative, giveme six months.
You can fire me after sixmonths if you don't like what's
going on.
Just give me six months andlet's see what happens.
And you could really createsome serious lemonade with that
lemony closet that nobody wantsto deal with, and I think it
would be a huge benefit to thecommunity with, and I think it
(31:49):
would be a huge benefit to thecommunity.
Amy Castro (31:50):
That's such a good point.
Yeah, you got me got my wheelsspinning.
I got to get settled first.
When I move, I don't even knowwhere I'm moving yet, but once I
get settled I may look for someof those opportunities.
Is there anything else that Ididn't ask you about that you
want to share, about PositivePantry we?
Stacy LeBaron (32:02):
do outreach with regards to Positive Pantry, and
I think it is an importantcomponent that, if you are going
to be longstanding in thecommunity, that you do have
outreach.
And I had mentioned a churchand I think churches are an
incredible resource and I am notparticularly religious at all,
but I feel like they are acommunity connection and they
are a hub.
(32:23):
And again, just to be really,really careful about your words
and how you are dealing withyour coming into a community
with pet food.
Just be very respectful of theresidents that are there and
really try and be careful abouthow you're presenting yourself
and the words that you're using.
And anything you say my tip ofthe week anything you say can
(32:43):
and will be put on the frontpage of a newspaper if we still
had paper newspapers, on thefront page of a newspaper, if we
still had paper newspapers.
So just put that in the back ofyour mind.
Is that anything that you sayout there can make the public
space.
And so please, please, just bevery courteous and careful with
your words.
Amy Castro (33:00):
That's good advice for all of us.
We see people left and rightgetting burned by their words
past, past and present.
So tell us about the CommunityCat podcast, because that's a
whole nother initiative that Ican't even imagine how busy you
are with all the things you'vegot going.
Stacy LeBaron (33:15):
So in 2016, I started the Community Cats
Podcast Again.
It was probably another way ofme processing my feelings of
being away from animal welfarewhile I was taking care of my
mom.
My mom passed away in 2019.
So I was still in the throes ofassisting and caring for my mom
, but I also had all these greatconnections with people in
(33:37):
animal welfare, done incrediblework with the Merrimack River
Feline Rescue Society.
We created a really a wonderfulprogram to basically reduce our
cat overpopulation problemreally a wonderful program to
basically reduce our catoverpopulation problem, reduce
our community cat situation, andI really wanted to share that
information with the public.
(34:02):
I had run a mentoring programand I assisted 80 groups on
starting trap neuter returnprograms for community cats.
So it's trap neuter return.
You get a little ear tip onyour ear, so the cats are.
You can see from a distance thecats are spayed and neutered or
sterilized and vaccinated.
So I ran this mentoring program.
I had 80 groups that I workedwith, but I had 400 groups on my
waiting list and that's anotherthing I'm so proud of is that
(34:24):
at any organization I've beeninvolved with, we return phone
calls, we respond to emails inas timely a manner as possible.
We want to be as responsive andhelpful as that we can and I
felt it was breaking my heartthat these 400 groups had
reached out to us and I wasn'table to help them and I was like
(34:45):
, okay, let's do a podcast.
Actually, my 13-year-old son atthe time, who was learning to
play the electric guitar, saidmom, you need a podcast.
And so he set me up with therecording material and I got
together with another colleaguethat I knew from the Merrimack
River Feline Rescue Society,kristen Petrie, my technical
tabby, who is still with metoday, and we started recording
(35:08):
in June of 2016.
And I loved it.
I just I loved it because it'sstories.
I just want to hear about thestories the positive, the
successful stories that we areall dealing with around the
world with cats.
Cats are worldwide, we all lovecats, we have a bond around cats
and I just started doing thepodcast in 2016.
(35:31):
And here we are in 2025.
And we're well over 600episodes and it's a weekly
podcast.
It comes out every Tuesday.
You can subscribe anywhere.
If you're not into the wholepodcast subscribing thing, we're
also up on YouTube and we alsooffer 30 online educational
events during the course of theyear.
So we have TNR out of theshadows, bring it forward and
(35:51):
say this is what you do when youhave cats in the community that
(36:16):
need to be spayed or neuteredand that need help, and it's a
collaborative effort.
It's one of the tools in thetoolbox to reduce cat
overpopulation.
Amy Castro (36:24):
Yeah, and I think it's definitely something.
Maybe we need to do a wholeother episode on that, because
we probably mentioned it, butI've not really done a full
episode about the subject,mostly because in our local
communities, interestinglyenough.
So the city of Houston has a,or maybe it's Harris County.
I'll clarify that and put thatin the show notes, but one or
the other major majororganization has a TNR program
(36:48):
with community cat coordinatorsand they've got the whole thing
going.
But yet a lot of these smallercommunities it's basically
illegal to, because you'rebasically releasing an animal to
be off leash, so anything thatpeople trap and that they have
their local animal controlpickup.
If it's feral it's going to geteuthanized and in three days,
(37:08):
so that's.
You know it's.
It's almost like anout-of-sight, out-of-mind thing,
like, oh, is it bothering me?
Because the cats were climbingon my car, so I had animal
control come get it.
Surely it got adopted or theydid something right by it, and
it's like they're not going totell you yeah, I'm taking this
back to euthanize it, but that'sbasically what happens.
So I think that's somethingthat people probably need to
educate themselves about alittle bit more if they care
(37:29):
about the cats that are in theircommunity, but it's a huge
problem in Texas for sure.
Stacy LeBaron (37:34):
Well, and even we need to educate ourselves too,
and I'm still learning thingsevery day about law.
So I teach a community catprogram management course at the
University of the Pacific.
It's an eight-weekcertification course all about
community cat program management.
Week certification course, allabout community cap program
management, and it's really agreat program for people who are
interested in entering intothat field of community cap
program management, whether it'sleading your own organization
(37:56):
or going into a municipalshelter and helping support
programming that way.
But things like so say, thestate of Texas says trap new to
return is legal, which I thinkmight have happened.
Now does that trickle down andsupersede the local town
ordinances, or do the local townordinances supersede the state
(38:17):
ruling?
So I think, keeping an eye onthose laws, especially Texas has
some incredibly interestingproposed bills coming out.
There's a group called AnimalPolicy Group that tracks all the
animal welfare bills all aroundthe country, and so it's a
great resource and it's justphenomenal the information that
(38:37):
they're able to pull out.
So there's like spay-neuterbills, proposed spay-neuter
bills for like license plate andfor checkoff on the tax return,
because we really do haveaccess to care issues.
So in the communities whereit's illegal to return the cats
back, which I always think.
We're just borrowing them for24 hours, exactly, we're just
borrowing them, but okay.
(38:59):
So then you really need to goafter the owned cat community
and provide a ton of owned catspay, neuter and if you're
really into the numbers, you canGoogle community cat calculator
and community cat pyramid andyou can determine the numbers
that you need to reach in yourcommunity or to reduce cat
overpopulation.
Amy Castro (39:17):
Well, we'll have to check that out.
Yeah, you may need to come backand do a whole episode on this
subject, because we could talkabout this for a long time.
And I need to educate myself alittle further, because we did
do a little TNR through ourrescue.
It was just one of the servicesthat we provided.
The dilemma that we ran intowas number one, the legalities,
and then it was just seemingly,you know, any person that
(39:38):
reached out that was having aproblem was not able to do their
part in helping with theproblem.
So it's like, okay, I can barelyget volunteers to come and
scoop litter boxes here.
I'm not going to get somebodydriving an hour away to some
neighborhood at six in themorning to pick up a trap and
then go stand in line at theSPCA in the hopes that you might
get in and get it spayed.
I mean, it's just, it's quitean undertaking, but it is doable
(40:00):
.
It is doable.
I think it just needs to be afocus of a particular group, and
that's what they do.
I think sometimes this idea oftrying to be able to provide
every service and a rescue, itjust it's too much.
We'll pay for it If you want totrap it.
If you can round it up, if youcan take it here, there or
anywhere, we'll pay for it.
But that's about all we do.
We'll even loan you the traps,but we're not going to do the
(40:20):
transporting because we justdon't have the people power.
Stacy LeBaron (40:22):
And we have to be respectful of that and we have
to understand that.
I mean I am never going tobottle feed a kitten, I am never
going to do that.
I thought I mean I already Idid the whole, like you know,
nursing with my kids andwhatever, and I thought it was
horrible.
I love my children dearly, butthat was terrible.
(40:44):
I like my sleep and I mean mycats.
They disturb my sleep too.
I do not own a cat because Itravel all the time now, so I
don't even I have a communitycat that lives with me a third
of the time.
In Switzerland we share amongstthree families one cat, but I
don't have a cat here in Vermontbecause I travel so much and so
, but yet look at what I'm doingfor cats.
(41:04):
Ok, so it's.
You know, everybody has a placeand we need to be respectful of
that and not expect.
You know I can't fostereverything, everybody, and if I
was had my house full of fostersand the shelter just because of
my mentality, I would worryabout all the.
I was worrying about like 80cats.
But then I had a friend who haddone a ton of trapping in a
(41:28):
community and she moved and shehad, I don't know, 25 or 30 cats
in her house and she was havinga hard time financially.
I'm like, well, why don't Ihelp her financially?
No-transcript.
(41:54):
But they are not a place inlife to have the cats.
But they can become like agodmother is what I used to call
myself.
I'm a godmother.
To that I would call up the vet.
I'm so-and-so's godmother.
Can I put you know X, y and Zon the account to help cover the
cost.
So it doesn't mean I don't playa role in this big picture.
It's just, it's a differenttype of relationship.
Amy Castro (42:15):
All right, and I think that's a great note to end
on is the idea that foreverybody who's listening
because one of my biggestfrustrations is everybody's got
something to say, right, blah,blah, blah.
Everybody's going to run theirmouth, they're going to make a
comment or whatever, and it'slike where's your damn check?
Send me a freaking check.
When was the last time youscoop one of our litter boxes?
Be part of the solution in someway.
You don't have to be a bottlefeeder.
(42:36):
It's funny you brought that upbecause I brought home some
bottle babies the other nightand I hadn't done them in years
but I've done hundreds of, soglad they're gone and because I
thought, oh, someday I'll getback into doing that.
No, maybe not.
Maybe I'll just be writing thecheck or something.
But do something, don't justrun your damn mouth.
(42:56):
I think take some kind of actionthat you can sustain, because I
think the other thing that issuper helpful to any
organization is people who aregoing to get involved with some
level of consistency, not Iexplode with this energy and
then I disappear after a week,kind of thing.
So really think about it.
And the other thing I wouldlike to say, too, is you know.
If you're not going to startyour own organization, totally
(43:17):
get it.
Reach out to your localorganizations and see where your
skills and your passions andyour sustainable effort can go
towards helping them, as opposedto being forced into doing
something that you don't want todo.
I mean, that's something that Ilearned.
That's how I got so involved incat rescue, even though we do
dogs.
It's like I volunteered at mylocal shelter and I realized the
(43:38):
dogs were fun for about one dayand then their shit covered
feet jumping on me and theirlong toenails.
I'm like, yeah, I'm done withthese big dogs.
Like no, not doing it.
So find your niche and thenstay in it and keep contributing
.
100% agree with you.
Well, stacey, thank you so muchfor being on the show.
I know you're a busy lady and Iappreciate you taking the time
to be on our little show and Ihope to hit 600 episodes.
(43:58):
We're just.
We just went over 100.
I don't know that's a lot ofepisodes, but we're every
Tuesday as well, so we'll nevercatch up with you, but keep
moving forward, keep movingforward.
Stacy LeBaron (44:08):
Congratulations.
Most podcasters don't make itpast like 20 or 30 episodes or
something, so you are a veteranpodcaster, so congratulations.
Amy Castro (44:16):
Amy, there we go.
Thank you so much and, foreverybody who's listening, thank
you for listening to anotherepisode of Muddy Paws and
Hairballs.
Get out there, don't be a mouth.
Be somebody that takes action,and we will see you next week.
Thanks for listening to MuddyPaws and Hairballs.
Be sure to visit our website atmuddypawsandhairballscom for
(44:36):
more resources and be sure tofollow this podcast on your
favorite podcast app so you'llnever miss a show.
And hey, if you like this show,text someone right now and say
I've got a podcastrecommendation.
You need to check the show outand tell them to listen and let
you know what they think.
Don't forget to tune in nextweek and every week for a brand
new episode.
And if you don't do anythingelse this week, give your pets a
big hug from us.
What if feeding your pet meant skipping meals
yourself?
Unfortunately, it's aheartbreaking reality for
countless pet owners.
Yet pet food insecurity is anissue that rarely gets the
attention it deserves.
Every day, people worldwidemake impossible choices Do they
pay the rent, do they buy theirgroceries or do they ensure that
their beloved pet doesn't gohungry.
But one organization isstepping in to change the game,
(00:23):
ensuring that no one has tochoose between feeding
themselves and feeding theirpets.
Stick around, because thisconversation is going to
challenge what you think youknow about pet welfare and what
it really takes to keep pets andtheir people together.
Welcome to Muddy Paws andHairballs, the podcast that cuts
through the fluff to talk aboutreal life of pet parents.
(00:44):
I'm Amy Castro, and today we'rediving into the issue of pet
food insecurity, a problem thataffects more families than you
probably think.
My guest today is StaceyLeBaron, a powerhouse in the
animal welfare world with morethan 30 years of experience
tackling cat overpopulation andpet welfare issues.
She's the founder and host ofthe Community Cats podcast,
(01:05):
where she has recorded more than600 episodes interviewing
experts from around the world.
She's also the president ofPositive Pantry, a nonprofit
working to ensure pets stay intheir homes by providing food to
families in need.
Today, we're going to talkabout the challenges of running
a pet food bank and how we canall be part of the solution.
(01:26):
So, stacey, welcome to the show.
Oh, thank you so much forhaving me, amy, awesome.
Well, you're even a moreexperienced podcaster than I am,
so I'm excited to have thisconversation.
But I know, as we were talkingbefore we started the recording,
that I think there's a lot ofoverlap in our experiences, but
you've just kind of likeexponentially done things on a
bigger scale.
So what inspired the PositivePantry?
Stacy LeBaron (01:48):
It was founded by Jen Bennett around.
I don't know if we remember wayback when to 2008 and 2009,
when we had another financialcrisis and people were
struggling to make ends meet,housing was an issue A lot of
people were underwater on theirmortgages and that kind of thing
and Jen Bennett, in that periodof time, up here in Warren,
(02:11):
vermont, we were in a littlearea called the Mad River Valley
, so Sugarbush, mad River Glenski area, and she started this
small group to focus on tryingto provide pet food to the
families in the Mad River Valleyduring this very challenging
period of time, and so she wasthe chief canine officer of the
(02:33):
Positive Pantry and so theystarted out with dog food and
cat food and they would get agroup of volunteers together.
They'd break bags down and theyhad like 10, we call them food
shelves in Vermont, so they'resmall food shelves and they're
open like two or three days aweek for a couple of hours and
they would deliver pet food tothese food shelves.
So about 10 of them.
So very, very small effort andit was very labor intensive.
(02:55):
You're buying food, you'rebreaking it down, you're zipping
up, you're doing all the bagsand you're labeling the bags
dating them, and I moved toVermont in around 2013.
It's about five years later Metup with Pazza Pantry.
At that point in time I hadstepped away from the day-to-day
animal welfare space and I wastaking care of my mom, who had
severe dementia at the time.
And so I realized, as you know,can't be all things to all
(03:19):
people and at that point in timeI really needed to make myself
available to my mom.
But I was like, well, pet food,how hard could that be, you
know.
And so keep me sort of ourboard.
So I became the chief felineofficer and her vice president
for several years, and then,about four or five years ago, we
(03:51):
flipped, and so she's our vicepresident and I'm now president
of Positive Pantry.
And the big thing that happenedfor our organization was about
eight or nine years ago.
We merged well, we collaboratewith the Vermont, the Greater
Vermont Food Bank.
So we now have we're nowstatewide and we cover the whole
state and we help facilitatemaking connections and
(04:14):
supporting the whole state ofVermont.
And then, of more recent time,after COVID, we merged with a
subcommittee or a pilot groupcalled the Pet Food Task Force,
and now we also coverMassachusetts.
So the why was.
I just felt like it wassomething for me to be involved
with, but I was, like you know,pet food so much easier than the
whole animal thing.
And then, of course, as withmany of us on our journey, it's
(04:37):
like, well, this happens, andthen this happens, and this
happens, and so it grows, andgrows, and grows and becomes a
great opportunity and it'sreally, it's a wonderful program
.
We just love to be able toprovide pet food to families in
need.
Amy Castro (04:49):
So is it something where you're really seeing these
ups and downs based on a directconnection to the economy, or
have things been pretty steady,or have they kind of been on the
rise?
Because I think the whole ideaof pet food insecurity is
probably not something that alot of people think about unless
they have the issue right Welland it's funny.
Stacy LeBaron (05:08):
So we try to define the issue too.
So there's veterinaryinsecurity and there's pet food
insecurity.
So most people can't afford a$400 vet bill.
So if their cat gets sick ortheir dog gets injured, runs
outside, eats something itshouldn't eat, most people have
a really hard time of evenaffording that veterinary visit,
(05:29):
and so we're also greatsupporters of if you can utilize
some of the pet food resources.
Please take advantage of thatand then put that money aside
that you would have paid to buythe food and put your little
coffee can I guess we don't docoffee cans anymore, but you
know we have your little savingsmechanism there to save the
(05:49):
money for that vet bill that youmay need down the line, because
the affordability in veterinarycare is just so challenging
right now for families also, andso it's trying to utilize
multiple levers to be able toput a patchwork together to help
families be able to keep theirpets, and so if, through taking
advantage of some of theseopportunities can help save some
(06:11):
money for folks to be able toafford the veterinary care that
they need for their pets, to youknow that all makes sense.
So we're not necessarily superreactive.
We're more of a like a steadyof supply.
However, I will say, duringCOVID the demands and need went
like through the roof, and itwas.
It was way up there, but thenthe donations were also way up
(06:34):
there too.
So and now we've kind of comeback down and we're more at a
like a pre COVID sort of steadylevel, and so that's that's been
better.
Amy Castro (06:43):
As a president of a nonprofit organization who has
to budget, this is more helpfulfor us and they say they're
looking to surrender a pet, myfirst question is always why,
versus saying yes, we can takeit, no, we can't, because we do
help with medical care, like wehad.
(07:11):
One of our kind of happieststories was a situation that was
a dog that had happy tail andthey kept smashing its tail open
and throwing blood all over thehouse.
So it got moved to livingoutside.
But the people couldn't affordthe surgery to fix the issue and
so they were looking tosurrender the dog and we
fundraised pretty quickly toraise the money for that surgery
.
But I've never really thoughtabout asking if we were able to
(07:32):
provide this, then how wouldthat help out?
But I think it's something foranimal welfare organizations and
for consumers or pet parents tothink about.
Don't get so focused on the vetbill.
Get focused on where could thatmoney come from otherwise or
how can I make up the difference, kind of thing.
So that's such a good point.
Stacy LeBaron (07:53):
And some veterinarians will have a
payment plan system or an option.
But then you say, oh, if I canprovide you $100, $200, whatever
of pet food and supplies permonth, then then you can move
that into your payment planmonth, then you can move that
into your payment plan.
And so there are just a lot ofdifferent ways to try and help
folks be able to make ends meetreally, and that's part of what
(08:13):
we are all about, and wecertainly we focus on the pet
food, but, as you've said, we'reall connected in this animal
welfare space and the more wecan collaborate, the better off
we're all going to be.
And so if I can learn as muchas I can about other programs to
share with others, I'm going todo that.
Amy Castro (08:29):
Yeah, that's a good point.
When people are looking tosurrender, the initial contact
is always about surrender, notabout how can you help me, or
can you give me the money tohelp for this surgery, or can
you pay for it, can you offsetit, can you help me fundraise?
Whatever it might be, and thoseare usually solutions we have
to present.
I mean, do you see that peopleare ashamed, embarrassed,
whatever words?
You want to fill in the blank,to ask for that help or to come
(08:51):
and use the pantry?
Stacy LeBaron (08:58):
even if their pet really needs it Right.
The way we work in most casesis we're providing the pet food
to a human food shelf, so we'renot necessarily touching the
people individually unless theycontact us via email or we're
doing a pop-up.
Sometimes we do some pop-upevents also and we do
fundraisers and outreach, andyou know, the people that we
deal with at Positive Pantry arealready thinking about how can
they band-aid the situationtogether.
(09:20):
So luckily we don't get thequestion of how can I surrender
my animal?
They're approaching us.
How can you help me be able tokeep my dog and my cat, even
though I've hit upon a hard timeand that kind of thing?
So luckily we don't have thelook of a rescue or a shelter,
so that conversation doesn'thappen.
(09:40):
I think when the phone callscome to a rescue or a shelter, I
think that the biases that'sall that they provide are those
services, and so I mean I, likeyou, would do a flip on it and
when somebody calls, I would saytell me what's going on in your
life and why is this happening,and you know what can we do to
partner together to enable youto continue to keep your pet.
(10:02):
So it's challenging, though,because I do think that the
general public has certainmindset of like I must give it
up because I can't afford it, orpeople think I should be able
to do this for my pet and thatkind of thing, and I just hope
that we can all just open up theconversation and just be open
and have just listening.
(10:23):
We need to listen a little bitbetter and I think we'd be much
more successful.
Amy Castro (10:27):
Yeah, that's, and that was actually where I was
going to go next with this,because you got me thinking
about the fact that when youthink about and I'm sure you see
the same kinds of posts that Isee you know somebody goes out
to their neighborhood Facebookgroup or to an animal rescue
group or whatever it might be,and they post something about
needing to rehome a pet, andimmediately there's this
backlash of I would never giveup my pet, even if I was moving
(10:50):
to the moon, I would buy aspaceship for my.
I mean, you know, justbasically beating that person
over the head for consideringgiving up their pet.
And then there's the wholeviewpoint of you know, if you
can't afford to feed your pet,then you probably shouldn't have
one.
And that comes from rescuepeople.
It comes from, you know, laypeople.
What are your thoughts on thatsubject?
(11:10):
The whole financial elementwhen we go out to adopt a pet is
something that we think aboutwhen we come from rescue,
because we want that animal tobe able to stay with that person
long term.
Stacy LeBaron (11:21):
Oh yeah, and you know it's a very case by case
basis with regards to people,some, some folk, their stress
levels.
So you know, if I was stressed,you know I didn't know where I
was going to get food for myfamily or for my pets.
I don't know how I would be.
(11:41):
But you know we have supportedfolks that are living in their
cars with their kids and theirpets because they don't want to
go to a homeless shelter,because they don't want to give
up their pets and they can makeit work.
They make it work and I meanI've had folks deliver pet food
to folks in their cars and it'slike you know, and the response
(12:13):
is, like you know, it's not thatbad.
So if it's temporary, I guess,if it becomes systemic and maybe
you see behavioral issues,anything that's causing harm to
the family, you know maybethat's a time to have to make
some decisions.
But it's about availing peopleof choices and to have those
choices and to feel like there'songoing support.
The one thing we try to be isvery clear with folks that we
will support with food for aperiod of time with individuals,
but we won't be lifelongsupporters.
(12:34):
So folks need to kind of thinkabout what they're gonna do
after a six month period of time.
Is there another resource?
We don't want them to becomesuper dependent on us because we
wanna be able to help others,but we also have a desire to not
like be like this is going tohelp you for seven days, because
I don't think you can solve anissue that might be happening in
(12:55):
your family in seven days.
But, like, six months is aboutour window where we start having
conversations at four to fivemonths and saying you know, do
you have a plan in place forsome more opportunity for your
animals?
And that kind of thing.
Deciding to surrender your petis a very personal decision and
it's one that you and I cannotmake for anybody else.
Amy Castro (13:14):
Yeah, that's so true , but yet people like to try to
think that they have the rightto express that opinion, which
is a shame, because what that?
I think what that does is itdrives people underground.
So, ok, fine, I'm going out tothis Facebook group, let's say,
or whatever social mediaplatform, and I'm asking for
help in rehoming my pet, andthen I get crucified and so,
(13:35):
therefore, I just dump my pet orI take it to a kill shelter or
whatever the case may be,because I don't want to face
that again.
I mean, people aren't going toput their hand on the stove more
than once before they learnthat lesson, and it's
unfortunate that people feellike they need to respond like
that.
So how does it?
What are the logistics of howthe pantry works?
Like, do people donate moneyand then you use that to buy pet
(13:56):
food?
Do you have people that arebringing bags of pet food and I
know you kind of talked a littlebit about the distribution
process, but how does that work?
Stacy LeBaron (14:05):
Yeah.
So I will talk about Vermontand I'll talk about
Massachusetts, because we're twovery different models.
So if you are out there andyou're interested in starting a
pet food pantry, I'm going toshare both models so that then
you can say oh, I think thiswould work in my area and this
would work in my area.
In Vermont we collaborate withthe Vermont Food Bank and we
have luckily been able to getthem connected in with a program
(14:27):
through Feeding America, whichhas had a large grant from
PetSmart Charities for pet food,and so they're able to put
their name in the hat and askfor large donations through that
.
That's helped basically fueltheir distribution system.
So thank you, thank you toPetSmart Charities for making
this program happen.
It's about 140,000 pounds ofpet food has come through them,
(14:50):
like in 2024.
So we couldn't do what we'redoing without that opportunity.
We've also had someopportunities through Greater
Good.
Basically, they enabled us totake in donations to a warehouse
that we as a smallvolunteer-based organization, we
just didn't have the capabilityto do that.
So they do all that heavylifting, literally, of bringing
(15:13):
the product in and getting itdistributed.
I'm also on the board of theVermont Humane Federation and so
many of those animal sheltershave pet pantries and we've
helped to support them in theirneeds when they're reaching out
to the community with regards totheir pet food needs.
So we try to make sure we'realways filling the gaps too, as
well as helping individuals.
(15:34):
And then if and local foodshelves get their food through
the Vermont Food Bank, but iffor some reason they run out of
food and they're betweendeliveries or whatever, we'll
bridge the gap also on that onetoo.
So we're just always trying tolook at different ways of being
able to help support.
We do fundraising.
We fundraise a lot through ourwebsite.
(15:54):
We have a holiday appeal thatwe do.
We do a lot of grant writing,because I think grant
organizations and donor advisedfunds can understand more of the
strategic picture that this isgoing to cover the whole state.
So if there's like acorporation that wants to cover
the whole state, we're prettyeasy way to cover pet food needs
all across the state, becausethat's our focus In
Massachusetts.
We do not have like an anchororganization that we collaborate
(16:18):
with, so we're a dating servicebetween retailers, food shelves
and then with our volunteers.
So like we'll have volunteersgo to retailers and say you know
, can you do a food drive, doyou get broken bags and they
create these connections andthen they'll get that food and
then they bring it over to thelocal food pantry that's willing
to include pet food and theybring it over there or they'll
(16:40):
do a pop-up in the parking lotof the human food pantry days
and they'll provide pet foodthere.
So we're always just trying tokind of that's.
We have to be creative inMassachusetts about.
You know how to think outsideof the box and then we'll
purchase food.
Through the grant money that weget and the donations we get.
We'll purchase again to bridgethe gap and make sure everybody
(17:00):
has enough volume.
We probably significantly andconsistently support about 50
food shelves all across thestate.
We have about 35 volunteers inMassachusetts and then we also
do help with the animal shelterstoo that have food pantries.
So again, you know, and we werelike Greenfield College had a,
which is a commuter college inwestern Massachusetts, and they
(17:25):
had started a food shelf or foodpantry, you know, for human
food.
But they were getting so manyrequests for pet food that we've
added pet food in there at theschool-run food shelf.
So we're pretty much anybodywho reaches out and asks us, we
try to figure something out.
Amy Castro (17:41):
So what do you find?
I mean, obviously that's two,like you said, two completely
different approaches, but yetthey're working.
What are the challenges?
You know if somebody's sittingout there thinking I could start
this on a smaller scale in mycommunity or grow it into a big
scale.
What are some of the biggestchallenges that you face?
Stacy LeBaron (17:57):
We are, at this point in time, quite focused on
staying all volunteer run and soI will be honest and say we
have wonderful volunteers, wehave a great group, but we're
very vulnerable on a smallhandful of people.
You know we're dependent onthem, which you know.
There you are, amy, you'renodding away, which is like
(18:17):
we've seen many organizationswhere you know you've got three
to five sort of key players andlike if something happened to
two of them, you know theorganization would be very
challenged.
And so I mean maybe that's justwhat presidents are supposed to
do, is just worry about thatkind of thing all the time.
But that's just one thing thatI think about is, you know, if
something were to happen to thepresident and the treasurer and
(18:42):
you've met some of them onlineand they're really doing
wonderful work but it is a worryfor any small nonprofit being
so vulnerable because you'resuch a small group of people.
But if someone was just startingout, I would say stay small.
Start small with just one foodshelf.
Develop your system that wayand see what works and what
doesn't work, because thenyou'll get an understanding of
(19:05):
what you could then replicatefor other food shelves.
And in my world I do like thehaving one representative a
volunteer representative foreach food shelf.
So I do like that model wherehere in Vermont it's more like
they'll email me and we'llfacilitate virtually, but to
have a designated ambassador orrepresentative for each food
(19:26):
shelf, I think makes it feelmore local and more
community-based and whenopportunities become apparent
you can take advantage of themlocally.
I'm not local for most of theseplaces, but there's the Girl
Scouts and the Boy Scouts andlots of opportunities for
campaigns and awareness andoutreach, and so I do like the
model the small is beautifulmodel of having one person
(19:49):
designated in each community.
So I would start small, butthink about scale when you start
small.
Amy Castro (19:56):
Yeah, yeah, you got to have that bigger picture.
But I like what you said as faras having that kind of
continuity of the representative, because I think that person
can also better see the futureand see where potential problems
, roadblocks or whatevershortfalls, whatever it might be
, if they are consistentlyworking with that same group or
with that same organization orin that same facility.
(20:18):
So that's definitely goodadvice.
Stacy LeBaron (20:20):
Can I also?
I'd just like to also mentionquickly too, for folks that are
involved in the sort of thesenior center council and aging
Meals on Wheels space.
There's also funding for foodfor Meals on Wheels, national
funding.
I did a podcast with thecommunity, kat's podcast with
the folks from Meals on Wheels,and so, even if you aren't set
(20:44):
up or you don't think thatthat's something that you can do
, you could help facilitate byreaching out to your local Meals
on Wheels and introducing themto Morgan, who runs the national
group enabling pet food to getthrough to their clients.
So you know, a lot of it can beconnections.
It doesn't have to revolvearound money.
A lot of what we've done isconnections and opportunities,
(21:06):
Like, I say, the dating servicebetween the retailers and the
food shelves, and so bylistening to this podcast you'll
be like, oh, maybe I shouldtalk to my counsel on aging and
see if they've connected aboutthe pet food program from Meals
on Wheels, which also includesveterinary care too.
Amy Castro (21:23):
That's good to know.
I did not know that.
I mean, it makes sense.
The pet food thing totallymakes sense with Meals on Wheels
, but it's not something that Iwould have thought about.
Another thing I would add too,just because I know it does
exist in our local communityaround here is coordinating or
working with your local, city,county, municipal animal shelter
.
Not all of them are going to beopen to being involved in
(21:44):
something like that, but I doknow just one in particular
that's local, that actually hasa little pet food pantry.
It's somewhat unfortunatebecause it's for the community
and the community is arelatively affluent community.
But at the same time, thatconcept of if there's some space
where we could store somethingon site, or even asking for your
local animal control to be areferral source you know, if you
(22:07):
were just starting small andmaybe you were stockpiling a
little of this and a little ofthat on your own and your local
animal control could reach outand say, hey, you know, we had
contact with this person who ispossibly looking to surrender
their pet we couldn't take thepet, but they might need your
help and at least making themaware that you're trying to do
something you never know whatkind of support you might get
from that local facility.
(22:27):
So, as far as the long-termvision for Positive Pantry, do
you see it expanding to morestates or just growing within
the two states where you've gotit?
What's on the horizon?
Stacy LeBaron (22:40):
Wow, great question, Amy, and I'd love for
you to tell me what's our nextstep?
Amy Castro (22:44):
Don't tell me Please , I can barely keep up with what
I'm doing now, let alone bigpicture.
Stacy LeBaron (22:49):
I mean honestly, my big picture would be to cover
New England.
I think the square footage ofNew England is maybe less than
Texas, so we can do things in aregional way, you know, and so I
do think that we're closeenough together that we could
get some pretty significantresources.
(23:11):
I know with trucking to theNortheast, sometimes
organizations feel like it's notworth it because they're just
coming to one place and they'regoing back.
So if I had a regional grouping, you know if they're going to
stop in Vermont, New Hampshire,Maine, you know, maybe that
makes it worth the trip.
So I think, in terms of gettinglarge scale product into the
(23:32):
region, I think having it coverall of New England would be
ideal.
Amy Castro (23:36):
Yeah, that would be great.
It's funny you talk about thecloseness, because Texas it's
nothing.
I can't leave my house and notdrive an hour, let's just put it
this way.
I mean, I can get to the localgrocery store in 12 minutes, but
for the most part, you know,everything is about an hour away
and so I am moving back to theEast Coast, not to New England,
but you know, when people talkabout being able to traverse the
entire state of Delaware in anhour and a half north to south,
(23:59):
it's like mind boggling to me,like how much.
And I'm from New Yorkoriginally, so I know that drive
from New York to Maine and it'slike it's amazing how many
states you can pass through in arelatively small amount of time
.
And I still would have onlybeen north of Dallas.
It's all definitely relative.
Any success stories that standout to you?
Sometimes, whether it's rescueor whether it's doing what
(24:19):
you're doing, there are thoseincidences that just help you
keep going because you see it'sworth it.
Stacy LeBaron (24:29):
Yeah, and unfortunately I'm going to have
to go back into the COVID erathat we're trying not to
remember.
But I'm going to go back intoCOVID and this is how we got
started in Massachusetts.
So they're in Chelsea,massachusetts, which is a little
town north of Boston, highpopulation diversity and a lot
of population turnover in thatcommunity and we had a group I
(24:52):
was running a group there thatdid not get into the pet food
space and I always regrettedthat, and so I was like this is
an opportunity to try and startsomething.
And one of the churches, anEpiscopal church, st Luke's,
reached out to us and they saidyou know, we'd be happy to take
pet food.
They'd gone from assisting like90 families to over 300
families on a weekly basis withfood in general human food but
(25:15):
they were getting requests forpet food, and so we collaborated
with the MSPCA of Boston.
So we heard the story from thepastor there.
It was funny because he saidthey opened up at 10 am on
Saturday mornings for their fooddistribution days and they have
a camera outside their door andit's like at like six or seven
(25:35):
in the morning in the heat ofJuly anyway, there's like a fold
out beach chair there right bythe front door, and then there's
, like, this older gentlemanjust sitting there like reading
the paper and just doing histhing, but he wanted to be first
in line, first in line for thisthe food pantry and so and this
was every saturday, thishappened every saturday, but
(25:56):
they told us the story so itgets to be 10 am, they open the
door and he goes in and he goesstraight to the cat food table
and it was just for some reason,that simple act of like.
This man was willing to spendthree hours every morning
waiting in line, so he was thefirst one to the pet food table
because, unfortunately, the petfood table was the first place
(26:18):
to have the product go yeah andso he he wanted to make sure he
was going to take care of hiscats through this whole period
of time and that was what wasmost important to him and it
seems it seems like not valuable, but it's incredibly valuable
because, you know, here he justloves his cat and he's willing
(26:40):
to do this for his cat and Imean, it's one of many stories
like that, but that was the onethat happened kind of during
COVID and I'm like, okay, thisis my why.
You know what.
I'm doing this for him.
I'm doing it for this gentlemanand all the other people that
are out there.
Just this morning, I had anotherperson from Massachusetts who
was housebound and she wasrunning out of litter and cat
(27:01):
food and dog food and I puttogether a delivery for her.
She was like I can't tell youhow much this means to me.
You know, so many people turntheir back on you and you are
just wonderful, and I was likeI'm not wonderful, I'm just
doing my job, you know.
I'm like you know, and it'slike there's, as you said
earlier, there's no shame inthis.
There's absolutely no shame inthis.
We have so much technology, wecan figure things out.
(27:23):
We have so many more resources,we have delivery services.
Amy Castro (27:38):
We have food shelves , we have mobile, we have
shelters.
There are just so many deliverysystems that I think everybody
should be able to access foodand potentially some supplies if
they need to.
Possible pet surrender thatyou're not seeing.
You know what I mean.
It's like all the people whoare looking out for their pets
before they're looking out forthemselves, or they do that
until they can't do that anymorekind of thing, and it's like
you haven't seen the journeythat that person has traveled
(28:00):
when they get to that point topost on a social media platform
or to reach out to a rescue.
So how about we take a littlestep back and be a little less,
a little less judgy and a littlemore helpful when it comes to
people trying to do just doingtheir very best for their pet,
and that's what they know to do,yep, for sure?
Stacy LeBaron (28:17):
Yeah, there's a book out, actually by Mel
Robbins called Let them.
You know, it's very much aboutsort of being stoic and I feel
like I try to do that a lot,which is what is it that I can
impact and what can I help tosupport others?
But, as you say, I'm not goingto tell somebody what to do.
I'm going to provide themeducation, provide them
(28:39):
information.
I'm going to provide them myown personal beliefs.
I can agree to disagree withanybody any day of the week, but
I also will respect them.
I mean, I have difficultconversations, probably on a
daily basis, and I'm comfortablewith that and I think we should
all be comfortable with it.
And then we also need to takethe time and the space to let it
digest and to say did I learnsomething new today?
(29:01):
Or maybe that's not for me andI'm going to go my way.
So we have to realize we cancontrol our own words, our own
actions, our own physical space.
We may not have control overothers and I don't think we
should ask others that we shouldhave control over them.
Amy Castro (29:19):
I agree.
I agree.
That's such a good point.
So if somebody is listening tothis right now and they want to
get involved and they want tohelp, obviously if they're in
Vermont or Massachusetts thereare options available that might
not be available if somebody'ssomewhere else in the world.
So could you kind of hit bothof those.
Like if somebody was looking toget involved and they lived in
the states that you serve, wheredo they go to get started?
Stacy LeBaron (29:42):
Sure, so obviously, as you just said, in
Massachusetts or Vermont, please, please, go to
positivepantryorg and it's P-A-Wpositivepantryorg and we have a
nice website there and you canfill out a form for being a
volunteer and all that kind ofstuff.
So we'd love to have volunteers, virtual volunteers, if you
(30:03):
want to do anything like socialmedia, grant writing, virtual
connections, emailing, checkingin with the various food shelves
and our collaborative partners.
So there are alwaysopportunities for folks that are
outside of the region too.
We like to be as inclusive aspossible.
And then also, if you're inother parts and you want to be
very hands-on and bedistributing food in your own
(30:25):
community, which I highlyrecommend, there are other
organizations.
If you just Google pet foodpantries in my area, I believe
there is actually a pet foodpantry directory of some
national organizations.
It may be linked to theColorado Pet Food Pantry, which
I also look at as a modelorganization for a statewide
(30:45):
initiative for pet fooddistribution.
So Colorado may be a state youwant to also take a look at if
you're looking at trying to setsomething up in your own area,
and it's definitely check withyour local shelter.
Oftentimes they'll be like ohyeah, we have, we get pet food,
we give it away.
And it's like very, all randomand like you'd be like, well,
you're looking for a coordinator, I could do it.
(31:05):
Right, I could, you know, letme see, cause you can do an
awful lot with the closet.
You really can do an awful lotwith the closet if it's, if it's
organized well and it's spacedout right and you communicate it
so they may welcome you in tohelp run a pet food pantry
within their own organization.
Because it's just, it's one ofthose things everybody's
overwhelmed and it's like, ohgosh, it's another thing I have
(31:26):
to deal with, right?
But if somebody comes in says,hey, I'd really be interested in
taking on this initiative, giveme six months.
You can fire me after sixmonths if you don't like what's
going on.
Just give me six months andlet's see what happens.
And you could really createsome serious lemonade with that
lemony closet that nobody wantsto deal with, and I think it
would be a huge benefit to thecommunity with, and I think it
(31:49):
would be a huge benefit to thecommunity.
Amy Castro (31:50):
That's such a good point.
Yeah, you got me got my wheelsspinning.
I got to get settled first.
When I move, I don't even knowwhere I'm moving yet, but once I
get settled I may look for someof those opportunities.
Is there anything else that Ididn't ask you about that you
want to share, about PositivePantry we?
Stacy LeBaron (32:02):
do outreach with regards to Positive Pantry, and
I think it is an importantcomponent that, if you are going
to be longstanding in thecommunity, that you do have
outreach.
And I had mentioned a churchand I think churches are an
incredible resource and I am notparticularly religious at all,
but I feel like they are acommunity connection and they
are a hub.
(32:23):
And again, just to be really,really careful about your words
and how you are dealing withyour coming into a community
with pet food.
Just be very respectful of theresidents that are there and
really try and be careful abouthow you're presenting yourself
and the words that you're using.
And anything you say my tip ofthe week anything you say can
(32:43):
and will be put on the frontpage of a newspaper if we still
had paper newspapers, on thefront page of a newspaper, if we
still had paper newspapers.
So just put that in the back ofyour mind.
Is that anything that you sayout there can make the public
space.
And so please, please, just bevery courteous and careful with
your words.
Amy Castro (33:00):
That's good advice for all of us.
We see people left and rightgetting burned by their words
past, past and present.
So tell us about the CommunityCat podcast, because that's a
whole nother initiative that Ican't even imagine how busy you
are with all the things you'vegot going.
Stacy LeBaron (33:15):
So in 2016, I started the Community Cats
Podcast Again.
It was probably another way ofme processing my feelings of
being away from animal welfarewhile I was taking care of my
mom.
My mom passed away in 2019.
So I was still in the throes ofassisting and caring for my mom
, but I also had all these greatconnections with people in
(33:37):
animal welfare, done incrediblework with the Merrimack River
Feline Rescue Society.
We created a really a wonderfulprogram to basically reduce our
cat overpopulation problemreally a wonderful program to
basically reduce our catoverpopulation problem, reduce
our community cat situation, andI really wanted to share that
information with the public.
(34:02):
I had run a mentoring programand I assisted 80 groups on
starting trap neuter returnprograms for community cats.
So it's trap neuter return.
You get a little ear tip onyour ear, so the cats are.
You can see from a distance thecats are spayed and neutered or
sterilized and vaccinated.
So I ran this mentoring program.
I had 80 groups that I workedwith, but I had 400 groups on my
waiting list and that's anotherthing I'm so proud of is that
(34:24):
at any organization I've beeninvolved with, we return phone
calls, we respond to emails inas timely a manner as possible.
We want to be as responsive andhelpful as that we can and I
felt it was breaking my heartthat these 400 groups had
reached out to us and I wasn'table to help them and I was like
(34:45):
, okay, let's do a podcast.
Actually, my 13-year-old son atthe time, who was learning to
play the electric guitar, saidmom, you need a podcast.
And so he set me up with therecording material and I got
together with another colleaguethat I knew from the Merrimack
River Feline Rescue Society,kristen Petrie, my technical
tabby, who is still with metoday, and we started recording
(35:08):
in June of 2016.
And I loved it.
I just I loved it because it'sstories.
I just want to hear about thestories the positive, the
successful stories that we areall dealing with around the
world with cats.
Cats are worldwide, we all lovecats, we have a bond around cats
and I just started doing thepodcast in 2016.
(35:31):
And here we are in 2025.
And we're well over 600episodes and it's a weekly
podcast.
It comes out every Tuesday.
You can subscribe anywhere.
If you're not into the wholepodcast subscribing thing, we're
also up on YouTube and we alsooffer 30 online educational
events during the course of theyear.
So we have TNR out of theshadows, bring it forward and
(35:51):
say this is what you do when youhave cats in the community that
(36:16):
need to be spayed or neuteredand that need help, and it's a
collaborative effort.
It's one of the tools in thetoolbox to reduce cat
overpopulation.
Amy Castro (36:24):
Yeah, and I think it's definitely something.
Maybe we need to do a wholeother episode on that, because
we probably mentioned it, butI've not really done a full
episode about the subject,mostly because in our local
communities, interestinglyenough.
So the city of Houston has a,or maybe it's Harris County.
I'll clarify that and put thatin the show notes, but one or
the other major majororganization has a TNR program
(36:48):
with community cat coordinatorsand they've got the whole thing
going.
But yet a lot of these smallercommunities it's basically
illegal to, because you'rebasically releasing an animal to
be off leash, so anything thatpeople trap and that they have
their local animal controlpickup.
If it's feral it's going to geteuthanized and in three days,
(37:08):
so that's.
You know it's.
It's almost like anout-of-sight, out-of-mind thing,
like, oh, is it bothering me?
Because the cats were climbingon my car, so I had animal
control come get it.
Surely it got adopted or theydid something right by it, and
it's like they're not going totell you yeah, I'm taking this
back to euthanize it, but that'sbasically what happens.
So I think that's somethingthat people probably need to
educate themselves about alittle bit more if they care
(37:29):
about the cats that are in theircommunity, but it's a huge
problem in Texas for sure.
Stacy LeBaron (37:34):
Well, and even we need to educate ourselves too,
and I'm still learning thingsevery day about law.
So I teach a community catprogram management course at the
University of the Pacific.
It's an eight-weekcertification course all about
community cat program management.
Week certification course, allabout community cap program
management, and it's really agreat program for people who are
interested in entering intothat field of community cap
program management, whether it'sleading your own organization
(37:56):
or going into a municipalshelter and helping support
programming that way.
But things like so say, thestate of Texas says trap new to
return is legal, which I thinkmight have happened.
Now does that trickle down andsupersede the local town
ordinances, or do the local townordinances supersede the state
(38:17):
ruling?
So I think, keeping an eye onthose laws, especially Texas has
some incredibly interestingproposed bills coming out.
There's a group called AnimalPolicy Group that tracks all the
animal welfare bills all aroundthe country, and so it's a
great resource and it's justphenomenal the information that
(38:37):
they're able to pull out.
So there's like spay-neuterbills, proposed spay-neuter
bills for like license plate andfor checkoff on the tax return,
because we really do haveaccess to care issues.
So in the communities whereit's illegal to return the cats
back, which I always think.
We're just borrowing them for24 hours, exactly, we're just
borrowing them, but okay.
(38:59):
So then you really need to goafter the owned cat community
and provide a ton of owned catspay, neuter and if you're
really into the numbers, you canGoogle community cat calculator
and community cat pyramid andyou can determine the numbers
that you need to reach in yourcommunity or to reduce cat
overpopulation.
Amy Castro (39:17):
Well, we'll have to check that out.
Yeah, you may need to come backand do a whole episode on this
subject, because we could talkabout this for a long time.
And I need to educate myself alittle further, because we did
do a little TNR through ourrescue.
It was just one of the servicesthat we provided.
The dilemma that we ran intowas number one, the legalities,
and then it was just seemingly,you know, any person that
(39:38):
reached out that was having aproblem was not able to do their
part in helping with theproblem.
So it's like, okay, I can barelyget volunteers to come and
scoop litter boxes here.
I'm not going to get somebodydriving an hour away to some
neighborhood at six in themorning to pick up a trap and
then go stand in line at theSPCA in the hopes that you might
get in and get it spayed.
I mean, it's just, it's quitean undertaking, but it is doable
(40:00):
.
It is doable.
I think it just needs to be afocus of a particular group, and
that's what they do.
I think sometimes this idea oftrying to be able to provide
every service and a rescue, itjust it's too much.
We'll pay for it If you want totrap it.
If you can round it up, if youcan take it here, there or
anywhere, we'll pay for it.
But that's about all we do.
We'll even loan you the traps,but we're not going to do the
(40:20):
transporting because we justdon't have the people power.
Stacy LeBaron (40:22):
And we have to be respectful of that and we have
to understand that.
I mean I am never going tobottle feed a kitten, I am never
going to do that.
I thought I mean I already Idid the whole, like you know,
nursing with my kids andwhatever, and I thought it was
horrible.
I love my children dearly, butthat was terrible.
(40:44):
I like my sleep and I mean mycats.
They disturb my sleep too.
I do not own a cat because Itravel all the time now, so I
don't even I have a communitycat that lives with me a third
of the time.
In Switzerland we share amongstthree families one cat, but I
don't have a cat here in Vermontbecause I travel so much and so
, but yet look at what I'm doingfor cats.
(41:04):
Ok, so it's.
You know, everybody has a placeand we need to be respectful of
that and not expect.
You know I can't fostereverything, everybody, and if I
was had my house full of fostersand the shelter just because of
my mentality, I would worryabout all the.
I was worrying about like 80cats.
But then I had a friend who haddone a ton of trapping in a
(41:28):
community and she moved and shehad, I don't know, 25 or 30 cats
in her house and she was havinga hard time financially.
I'm like, well, why don't Ihelp her financially?
No-transcript.
(41:54):
But they are not a place inlife to have the cats.
But they can become like agodmother is what I used to call
myself.
I'm a godmother.
To that I would call up the vet.
I'm so-and-so's godmother.
Can I put you know X, y and Zon the account to help cover the
cost.
So it doesn't mean I don't playa role in this big picture.
It's just, it's a differenttype of relationship.
Amy Castro (42:15):
All right, and I think that's a great note to end
on is the idea that foreverybody who's listening
because one of my biggestfrustrations is everybody's got
something to say, right, blah,blah, blah.
Everybody's going to run theirmouth, they're going to make a
comment or whatever, and it'slike where's your damn check?
Send me a freaking check.
When was the last time youscoop one of our litter boxes?
Be part of the solution in someway.
You don't have to be a bottlefeeder.
(42:36):
It's funny you brought that upbecause I brought home some
bottle babies the other nightand I hadn't done them in years
but I've done hundreds of, soglad they're gone and because I
thought, oh, someday I'll getback into doing that.
No, maybe not.
Maybe I'll just be writing thecheck or something.
But do something, don't justrun your damn mouth.
(42:56):
I think take some kind of actionthat you can sustain, because I
think the other thing that issuper helpful to any
organization is people who aregoing to get involved with some
level of consistency, not Iexplode with this energy and
then I disappear after a week,kind of thing.
So really think about it.
And the other thing I wouldlike to say, too, is you know.
If you're not going to startyour own organization, totally
(43:17):
get it.
Reach out to your localorganizations and see where your
skills and your passions andyour sustainable effort can go
towards helping them, as opposedto being forced into doing
something that you don't want todo.
I mean, that's something that Ilearned.
That's how I got so involved incat rescue, even though we do
dogs.
It's like I volunteered at mylocal shelter and I realized the
(43:38):
dogs were fun for about one dayand then their shit covered
feet jumping on me and theirlong toenails.
I'm like, yeah, I'm done withthese big dogs.
Like no, not doing it.
So find your niche and thenstay in it and keep contributing
.
100% agree with you.
Well, stacey, thank you so muchfor being on the show.
I know you're a busy lady and Iappreciate you taking the time
to be on our little show and Ihope to hit 600 episodes.
(43:58):
We're just.
We just went over 100.
I don't know that's a lot ofepisodes, but we're every
Tuesday as well, so we'll nevercatch up with you, but keep
moving forward, keep movingforward.
Stacy LeBaron (44:08):
Congratulations.
Most podcasters don't make itpast like 20 or 30 episodes or
something, so you are a veteranpodcaster, so congratulations.
Amy Castro (44:16):
Amy, there we go.
Thank you so much and, foreverybody who's listening, thank
you for listening to anotherepisode of Muddy Paws and
Hairballs.
Get out there, don't be a mouth.
Be somebody that takes action,and we will see you next week.
Thanks for listening to MuddyPaws and Hairballs.
Be sure to visit our website atmuddypawsandhairballscom for
(44:36):
more resources and be sure tofollow this podcast on your
favorite podcast app so you'llnever miss a show.
And hey, if you like this show,text someone right now and say
I've got a podcastrecommendation.
You need to check the show outand tell them to listen and let
you know what they think.
Don't forget to tune in nextweek and every week for a brand
new episode.
And if you don't do anythingelse this week, give your pets a
big hug from us.
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