(Prince Albert SPCA/ Facebook)

By Ian Gustafson

Returning to normal

Hope and the Future: SPCA looking forward to doing more fundraisers in the new year

Dec 24, 2020 | 8:00 AM

The COVID-19 pandemic makes 2020 a year many may prefer to forget, but there is hope for the future. We’ve decided to make that the focus of our series of end-of-year stories.

The Prince Albert SPCA volunteers will be looking to continue to do the best they can through the COVID-19 pandemic, but Manager Ashlee Bober said they plan for more fundraisers this upcoming year.

“We’re looking forward to what’s to come next year and obviously finding as many animals homes as we can as we know the numbers of animals coming in definitely isn’t going to slow down,” Bober said. “So, we’re looking forward to seeing how many we can help out again next year.”

Since the pandemic began the SPCA is unable to do many of its big in-person fundraisers and she said it’s been a challenge not having those events.

“We’re definitely looking forward to hopefully having some more meet and greets this next year,” she added.

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Some of the meet and greets consist of taking animals out to the pet stores for people to meet who can’t make it out to the SPCA.

The non-profit organization is looking into organizing more virtual or online fundraisers in the absence of in-person events and are looking into different ways to do it.

“Who knows maybe it’ll be a hit and something in the future we can continue doing virtual and online fundraisers as well as in-person ones,” she said.

They are also hoping in the new year they’ll be able to bring volunteers back into the building. They haven’t brought any volunteers in because of the public health restrictions and to keep their staff healthy.

This year she said they’ve learned some news ways of doing things especially online. Working online has broadened how they reach people and how people can help them such as people who can’t physically be there.

“It’s kind of a whole new world that we’re walking into, but you know we’re making the best of it and the people in our community and in the province have been really supportive,” she said. “We’re very grateful for that and we’re hoping people continue their support.”

In November it was reported the SPCA was seeing a spike in adoptions due to the pandemic. Bober said their dog adoptions have remained consistent but their cat adoptions have slowed down recently. They’re working on finding more of the cats homes soon but they’re hopeful they can carry the surge of adoptions into next year.

However, Bober said they’re prepared usually after Christmas time when they do see a large influx of animals being brought in unfortunately due to people getting animals as Christmas presents and not being able to take care of them. They’re counting on this year will being different and “they’re hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.”

Bober would like to thank everyone who has helped them this year whether it was a donation, fostering an animal, adopting or volunteering.

“It’s really appreciated and we’re looking forward to taking on a new year,” she said.

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Ian.gustafson@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @princealbertnow