Atlanta Lab Rescue

Hallelujah, Hail Mary and Happy Holidays!

Another year has come to an end and for all of our Atlanta Lab Rescue family and friends it means another 327 dogs that found a second chance at a better life. In fact, in October, we hit a milestone of 2,000 dogs rescued when Bama came to us from Gordon County Shelter. Do you realize that the “average” shelter in Georgia houses around 65 dogs? That means we have cleared out close to 30 shelters since we started….Hallelujah!!!!
It’s pretty amazing when you see what a grassroots effort this rescue is, but so many of you have helped in so many ways that together we’ve been able to accomplish impossible things. Our communications coordinator fielded a seemingly endless string of phone calls and email inquiries every day. Volunteers clocked hundreds of administrative hours, while others drove hundreds of miles, and when we committed to take a dog, we moved mountains to make it happen. The vets kept the faith as they let us bring in dog after dog and our boarding partners set up crates or doubled up dogs to make room for “just one more.” Fosters answered Facebook pleas and adopters embraced our notion that you don’t have to be purebred to be loveable (or even a lab, in some cases).

Great accomplishments have come with a great price (you knew this part was coming) and once again we find ourselves swimming in debt. A whopping 42% of our dogs this year were heartworm positive. Basically, we rescued every dog that the others left behind. Financially it’s foolish, but that’s how we roll. In addition, many dogs ended up at the shelter as a casualty of the economy and, with no vaccines or preventative care, even the seemingly healthy dogs arrived with a myriad of health issues that drove the average cost per dog to over $850.

In football, a Hail Mary is defined as a “long, low-probability pass attempted when a team is too far from the end zone to execute a more conventional play.” You could call this final $5 Friday of 2013 our Atlanta Lab Rescue Hail Mary. The “conventional methods,” like not taking in dogs when you don’t have money, haven’t worked, so we’re asking everyone who sees this to consider donating $5 (or more) to help us get our fiscal “game” healthy again and get us out from under this mountain of debt. In the past few weeks we’ve gotten some wonderful donations and a challenge by one donor to match the first $1,500 on $5 Friday. We hope EVERYONE will rally around so Atlanta Lab Rescue can continue to clear out more shelters throughout Georgia and the Southeast!

As we close the year, we would like to wish you all a Happy Holiday and thank you again for your prayers and support. There is no better way to convey our appreciation than to show you some of the lives that have been touched by your help. As you watch this video, keep in mind that this isn’t even a third of the dogs that we rescued in 2013…an amazing perspective on an amazing effort! Looking forward to many more new faces in the new year.  http://youtu.be/QVOBIMtUqa4

To Make Your $5 Friday Donation Click Here

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