Out of the Cage! (Fall/Holiday 2007)

Fall Adoption Events Create Happy Homes

Beneath a clear blue autumn sky, Mayor's Alliance Participating Organizations brought dogs and cats for adoption to Union Square Park on Sunday, October 21, for the final Mayor's Alliance/Maddie's Pet Adoption Festival of the 2007 season. Some of the dogs for adoption and volunteers were decked out in Halloween costumes, while event-goers met new furry family members, had their dog or cat microchipped, and met best-selling author Lee Harrington, who gave out autographed copies of her book: Rex and the City: A Memoir of a Woman, a Man, and a Dysfunctional Dog, for a donation to the Mayor's Alliance.

Just a week before, hundreds of adopters turned out for the annual Adopt-A-Cat event, which ran in tandem with the Cat Fanciers' Association (CFA)-IAMS Cat Championship at Madison Square Garden on October 13–14. Several hundred cats and kittens from twenty-five APOs found loving homes during the two-day event, while outside the Garden, event-goers and passers-by toured the Code 3 Associates Big Animal Rescue Truck (BART). BART is the mobile emergency animal hospital that responds across the country to disasters involving animals, and was featured in a NY 1 news segment earlier in the week. Its presence, arranged by CFA President Pam DelaBar, who serves on Code 3 Associates' board, raised awareness among New Yorkers of the importance of preparing for pets in an emergency.

This year's Adopt-A-Cat event received plenty of pre-event promotion when, for the first time ever, outdoor banners advertising the event were displayed from light posts throughout the surrounding blocks and across 34th Street to Fifth Avenue. (The banners were later offered to all the shelters and rescue groups that participated in the event.) Additionally, in the days leading up to and during the event, a mesmerizing video of cats and kittens for adoption, created by Rational Animal, captured the attention of thousands of New Yorkers from the huge plasma screen outside the Seventh Avenue entrance to Penn Station and Madison Square Garden. Our thanks to the Cat Fanciers' Association and the ASPCA for partnering with the Mayor's Alliance to have these promotional materials produced.

In mid-September, late-summer adopters came out in force for the Mayor's Alliance/Maddie's Pet Adoption Festival and low-cost microchipping clinic in Central Park. Plenty of cats, dogs — and even rabbits — found homes at the event, while the Maddie's Fund mascot strolled the park and surrounding area, making new friends and directing people to the event.

Miho Sakai, a television producer with NHK Enterprises, brought a film crew to the event to capture it as part of a documentary for Japanese television.

While adoption events are among our most important activities to "bring the animals to the people" outside the shelter setting, Mayor's Alliance microchipping clinics, which are featured at all Mayor's Alliance/Maddie's Pet Adoption Festivals, are becoming more in demand throughout the city. This year the Mayor's Alliance was invited by numerous organizations to stage low-cost microchipping clinics at neighborhood events, including AKC Responsible Dog Ownership Day, the Battery Park Block Party, the Central Park Conservancy PAWS Country Fair, Marine Park in Brooklyn, Dogswalk in Flushing Meadow Park, and It's My Bark Day in Rockaway Beach, Queens.

If your neighborhood group, block association or dog park group wants to include a Mayor's Alliance low-cost microchipping clinic at your 2008 event, please e-mail info@AnimalAllianceNYC.org.