Help clear the shelters with Emancipet on August 19

Clear the Shelter, an annual nationwide pet adoption drive that helps find loving homes for animals in need, will take place on Saturday, August 19. Hundreds of shelters across the U.S. will participate. Emancipet supports the Clear the Shelter initiative each year because the inability to afford veterinary care accounts for half of all pets surrendered to shelters when you exclude family and housing issues.

Liz Parker of Emancipet joined KXAN’s Amanda Tatum on Studio 512 to share details about the campaign and how everyone can do their part to help. View the clip here. 

Emancipet is a nonprofit on a mission to make high-quality spay/neuter and veterinary care affordable and accessible to all pet owners. When pet owners who made up to $50k yearly were asked what would have helped them keep their pet, 46 percent said free or low-cost vet care. Clearing out the shelter and making life-changing bonds between people and animals is just half the effort, though. The other half is making sure those bonds never have to be broken for reasons like a lack of affordable veterinary care.

“Of the more than 100 doctors, technicians, and other support staff at Emancipet, we can’t name a single one that does not have a pet, nor a single person that did not find or adopt that pet,” says Liz Parker of Emancipet. “Emancipet loves homeless pets and even homeless pet owners! Emancipet will always be a major contributor to the no-kill effort by making sure pets are not surrendered to shelters as well as making sure that when they leave the shelter, their family can afford to keep their pet healthy and increase generally the amount of love in our community.”

Nearly 54,000 pets found their forever homes during last year’s Clear the Shelters campaign.  To find a shelter near you, go to ClearTheShelters.com. To learn more about Emancipet, visit them at one of their Austin locations or go to emancipet.org.