Party for pets

OTHELLO — Lisa Newton and her good buddy, Crumpet the cat, probably wouldn’t have known each other without Adams County Pet Rescue. Giving other cats and dogs — and the occasional lizard and bird — the same chance as Crumpet was one reason Newton drove over from Seattle to attend the ACPR’s “Party for the Paws” fundraising dinner Saturday night.

The dinner raised more than $20,000 for ACPR, according to the group’s social media, and the crowd almost overflowed the venue at Phoenix Family Farms near Othello. The proceeds will be used for shelter operations, said ACPR director Kyya Grant.

Newton is a veterinarian who volunteers with ACPR about three times each year. She knew what she wanted when it came to a pet, and she gave Grant a description.

“I told Kyya that I wanted an overwhipped whipped cream long-haired calico,” Newton said. “I was over here (on) May 1 two years ago. We were in Ephrata, and as we were finishing the last cat (at a spay/neuter clinic), Kyya sent me pictures of this really mad 17-ounce kitten.”

The really mad little kitten was named Crumpet, Crumpy for short. She was with Newton when both her father and mother passed away, and was there not long ago when a good friend passed away.

“Crumpy means the world to me,” Newton said.

There are advantages for humans who are part of the ACPR support network as well. Cheri Sisco turned to ACPR when a couple of her dogs started getting older. Then there were some changes in her life – pretty big changes – and she moved, and lost touch with ACPR. One day she was in the vicinity of Othello and decided to stop in. Grant asked her to volunteer as a foster, she said, and she agreed. It turned out to be what she needed.

“It helped me kind of get back out in the world and that I have something to offer,” Sisco said.

Adams County Pet Rescue has found a home for lots of pets, but there are still more animals out there. Grant was the designated runner for the dinner Saturday night, driving back and forth to ACPR for supplies and materials.

“I (went) to the shelter to print something off, I came out, locked the door and somebody was in the parking lot with a husky they found on McManamon Road,” Grant said.

Currently, there are a lot of dogs and cats who need help and their owners, or the people who find them, are turning to ACPR.

“Right now there are currently 124 dogs on the books, but there’s a few more (not registered yet),” Grant said. “We are getting calls – this week, we’ve probably had at least six calls, average, a day, maybe more, from people wanting to surrender their dogs, or they have stray dogs. A lot of them are out of county. A lot of them (are) from the Tri-Cities, a lot of them from Grant County.

“There are just so many animals out there, and the shelters are so full right now. And adoptions are very low. Our really cute chihuahua puppies that normally would get 15 to 25 applications, we’re getting zero applications,” she added.

While there are a lot of animals, there were also a lot of people willing to support ACPR on a hot summer afternoon. Phoenix Family Farm owner Heather Miller said it was one of the biggest crowds yet at her year-old event venue.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen my parking lot this full,” Miller said.

Advance ticket sales were good, but enough people bought tickets at the door to fill nearly every seat, Miller said. So many people showed up that the ACPR staff ran out of bidder paddles. One family of latecomers said they weren’t interested in having dinner, they were just there to bid on auction items.

“This is pretty exciting,” Grant said. “We’ll do this again.”

Cheryl Schweizer may be reached via email at cschweizer@columbiabasinherald.com.