Volunteers are always needed for a variety of different things! Some of them are listed below. We also welcome responsible, caring, dedicated people to our foster program. This can be short term (a couple days in emergent situations), or long term (weeks, or possibly a few months, until our animals get their forever homes, or we can bring them back into the shelter again). This is entirely up to you. You can foster dogs only, cats only or both! We provide the food and vet care; you provide a stable home for our animal. It’s a great way to help our animals prepare for their life in a new forever home! We also welcome new volunteers to join our Board of Directors, if you feel you’d like to be more involved with the administrative side of things. So, lots to think about; contact us if interested in sharing your time with PAWS!
Weekend Chores – We have a rotation of people who do Saturday/Sunday chores, both morning and evening. We do only the basics – feed and water the animals, clean their cages, kennels and main living areas, keep up with any laundry, rotate dogs inside/outside as needed and keep the facility looking as good as it does during the week! We are flexible in scheduling, and if you prefer only dogs or only cats, only mornings or only evenings, we try to accommodate!
Dog Walking – We have several opportunities for dog walking again! You can walk on weekday mornings from 8 – 9:30 and evenings from 5 – 6:30, and also on weekends, if you are able to coordinate with our weekend chores volunteers. You can walk whatever size dog you’d like! If you are more comfortable with smaller dogs, that’s fine! If you can handle the big ones, or enjoy a good run – that’s great too! Dogs that have not had their shots are not eligible for walking, and there is also a procedure in place for all the dog walkers to know what dogs are able to be walked. Come on down and check us out! It’s not only great exercise for the dogs, but a nice long walk is very therapeutic for us humans as well!
Cat Socializing – We’d love to have you come spend some time loving our fabulous felines – they need their special one-on-one time too! All the cats that are out in the room are accessible by everyone, and they all love their attention! We encourage playing, brushing, cuddling and loving our beautiful cats, but as you cat-lovers all know, it’s all up to the cats as to what they will allow us humans to do with them 🙂
Adoption Events – We have adoption events both locally and out-of-town. When we have these events, we need people to help transfer and care for the animals during the event. These events are usually held on Saturdays, and if they are here in Jefferson, you can come and go as needed. However, if we go out of town, be prepared to schedule in the whole day! We partner with Petsmart in Des Moines, so every 3 months we have to attend one of their national adoption events. They run from approximately 10am – 4 pm, so we have to plan accordingly. We are also looking at a few new places to have these events. Why do we do this, you may wonder? In short, we do all this for our animals! We need to “be seen” for them to get adopted. And our wonderful dogs and cats get away for a day to be loved on by lots of people! Again, contact us if interested…we’d love to have you!
