March 11th 2007 

A federal law signed by President Bush last fall requires states and localities to plan for pets or risk losing money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In response, Virginia's General Assembly passed legislation requiring the state to include provisions for pets and farm animals in its state emergency-response plan.

Initiative to help find shelter for pets in emergency

By the Associated Press

RICHMOND, Va. -- In an emergency that calls for evacuation, Helen Green is sure about one thing: She wouldn't leave her four dogs behind, even if it meant risking her own life.

"They're my best friends," the Chesterfield County resident said. "They're the glue that holds my life together."

A new statewide initiative aims to prevent Virginians from having to make such a choice. The state is working with veterinarians and animal-welfare organizations to create a network for helping pet owners find shelter with their animals in an emergency.

The network will help state and local officials plan for the worst and supply them with information about volunteer training, shelters where people can take pets, and equipment to care for animals.

A federal law signed by President Bush last fall requires states and localities to plan for pets or risk losing money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In response, Virginia's General Assembly passed legislation requiring the state to include provisions for pets and farm animals in its state emergency-response plan.

Animal-welfare advocates have been calling for these measures for years.

"It's good that it's finally being recognized instead of belittled and demeaned," said Peggy Allen, vice president of the Virginia Federation of Humane Societies.

The change was prompted by Hurricane Katrina.

One of Green's dogs, a burly mixed breed named Sawyer, became a refugee after Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast a year and a half ago. Sawyer was among more than 250 dogs and cats evacuated from Mississippi after the storm by volunteers from a Richmond veterinary clinic owned by Dr. Betty Baugh Harrison.

"I wonder sometimes about his owner," Green said. "They obviously loved him. I wonder if they got out."

There is no estimate of how many dogs and cats were evacuated to Virginia from the Gulf Coast after Katrina and then Hurricane Rita. Estimates of animals killed or lost range into the hundreds of thousands.

Dr. Al Henry saw the worst during two weeks he spent in St. Bernard Parish, next to the devastated Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans.

"There was nothing there," said Henry, a Lynchburg veterinarian and immediate past president of the Virginia Veterinary Medical Association.

Henry set up a makeshift animal shelter in a damaged warehouse in Chalmette, La. He took care of more than 450 animals in the shelter, dubbed Camp Lucky. Animal-rescue workers would follow the sound of barking dogs and find the owners dead in the home. Some had died because they refused to leave without their pets.

"I'd hate for Virginia ... to not have a plan for this," Henry said.

Virginia's veterinarians play a leading role in the agreement announced last month among public, nonprofit and professional organizations to set up a network for helping pet owners and their animals in a disaster.

The memorandum of understanding brings together the veterinary association, the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine, the Virginia Federation of Humane Societies, the Virginia Department of Emergency Management and the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.