The Santa Cruz County Animal Shelter Foundation

In Santa Cruz, the primary organization safeguarding and improving the lives of domestic animals is the Santa Cruz County Animal Shelter. The Shelter, whose intake exceeds five thousand animals a year, has a bedrock of municipal funding for core services such as animal control, licensing, rabies vaccinations, housing for strays and surrenders, and intervention in animal abuse cases. 

Unfortunately, the Shelter’s key preventive initiatives – spay/neuter clinics, training classes, humane education, and community outreach – require independent funding. These are the programs that help animals and their guardians beyond the Shelter’s doors. These are the programs that are the agents of change. These are the programs that cannot go forward without a steady stream of donations from private sources.

The purpose of the Santa Cruz County Animal Shelter Foundation is to raise charitable dollars in support of the Santa Cruz County Animal Shelter and its mission. The Shelter is the county’s sole open-admission facility, offering protective custody, handling abuse cases, housing strays and surrenders, and even assuming guardianship of abandoned and maltreated farm animals. Shelter workers are primarily focused on providing care and crisis intervention to the county’s neediest animals. Unlike private rescue organizations, the Shelter has no fundraising staff and insufficient budgetary resources to conduct sophisticated fundraising events. 

The goal of the Foundation is to step in and fill that void. We want to ensure that the Shelter will have a steady source of private funding to provide program stability and expansion of proven preventive outreach. 

Visit the Shelter's website to learn more about its mission and the vital programs this Foundation is working to support!