Maddie's Fund® has made a significant change in its grant guidelines for community collaborations.
Humane organizations no longer have sole responsibility for implementing spay/neuter programs. We're now looking to the veterinary profession to help with this task and share in our grants.
How does it work?
Communities interested in applying for a Maddie's Fund grant must now have two components, an adoption component led by humane organizations and a spay/neuter component led by the veterinary profession.
The humane component consists of a coalition of traditional shelters, rescue groups, animal control agencies and no-kill organizations and is responsible for increasing adoptions. The coalition is administered by a no-kill "lead agency." The coalition
- gathers baseline statistics from all of the animal shelters and rescue organizations,
- formulates a budget and business plan for increasing shelter adoptions and reducing shelter deaths, and
- completes a Maddie's Fund Adoption Application.
The veterinarian component operates under the auspices of a veterinary medical association which can be a state, county, regional or city association, depending on each community's situation.
The veterinary medical association (VMA)
- contacts community practitioners to see if they're interested in enrolling in a spay/neuter program for pets of Medicaid recipients,
- gathers baseline spay/neuter statistics from enrolled veterinarians, and
- completes a separate Maddie's Fund Spay/Neuter Application.
Once funded, the VMA
- sends out guidelines and reimbursement forms to doctors,
- processes claims for payment,
- promotes the program,
- collects monthly statistics from participating vets, and
- prepares quarterly, semiannual, and annual reports for Maddie's Fund documenting the progress of the grant.
Participating doctors are reimbursed at the rate of $30 – $110 per surgery, which includes a $10 – $20 co-payment from the public, and the VMA is paid to administer the program.
Maddie's Fund has made this change for both practical and philosophical reasons.
We've learned a lot from the projects we've funded. One thing we've discovered is that it's just plain hard for humane coalitions to successfully manage and implement spay/neuter and adoption programs. It's especially hard to create and put in operation spay/neuter programs with private practice veterinarians to achieve above baseline performance.
We've also realized that veterinarians respond with greater enthusiasm to proposals from other veterinarians, especially professional veterinary associations. This makes perfect sense. Most people relate better to their colleagues than to outsiders.
The question is, why work with private practice veterinarians at all? Why not just invest in high volume spay/neuter clinics run by humane organizations?
High volume spay/neuter clinics do a great job, and the humane community is committed to their ongoing success. But Maddie's Fund wants to expand the network and build upon what is already being done. We want to use some of our resources to entice more veterinarians to get involved: to help with spay/neuter surgeries, to work with local animal shelters – to help build community-wide safety nets of care.
Maddie's Fund believes it's time to open outstretched arms to a very precious resource right under our nose – an army of respected veterinary professionals who have the ability to make a world of difference for homeless, abandoned animals.
