Five Grants to Help Homeless and Needy Pets

Is your animal shelter or rescue group looking for additional cash to start new programs for homeless pets or help needy pets in your area? Check these five foundations and charities for grant opportunities. Some are large and well known but they often make grants to smaller organizations.

Petfinder Foundation offers a variety of disaster recovery and emergency response grants.

This Disaster Fund can help pets, pet owners, and animal welfare organizations when natural (hurricanes, tornadoes, fires, floods, earthquakes, and other events) or man-made disasters hit a community. Disaster Fund grants typically range from $500 to $5,000 and support the following needs:

– Emergency equipment or supplies, including communications and technological equipment
— Emergency animal transport and housing
— Information management systems to enable operations during and after disasters (business continuity)
— Equipment and training for critical responders (incident command and/or emergency training activities)

To apply for financial assistance or for emergency product requests, please fill out the online application.

The PETCO Foundation offers four types of grants including Capital Grants, Product Support, We Are Family Too, and 4 Rs Project Support. Read about the guidelines of the grant process here.

Check Charitable Partners by State to see what animal rescue groups and shelters are already associated with this foundation.

The ASPCA offers many grant opportunities. See the types of grants offered by the ASPCA as well as guidelines for grant applications. Types of grants include:

– spay / neuter programs and high volume adoption events
— training that supports efforts to increase live release rates or increase capacity for lifesaving programs
— safety net programs for vulnerable animals (e.g. a pet food bank to keep animals in their homes)

Safety net programs are so important right now in our bad economy. Many pet parents just can’t afford food and veterinary care for their pets. A pet food bank could make a difference in financially stressed families keeping their pets.

Planet Dog Foundation offers grants for assistance and therapy dogs as well as other canine service programs. These include K-9 search and rescue programs, police, fire and military dogs, wildlife conservation dogs, disease detection dogs, and other innovative programs.

RedRover Relief (formerly United Animal Nations Lifeline Grants) offers a variety of grants, including relief grants for good Samaritans to cover emergency veterinary care and relief grants for domestic violence. You can link to more information and guidelines for a grant application from this page.