"Saving just one dog won't change the world, but it surely will change the world for that one dog."

Welcome!

The Friends of the Schuyler County Animal Shelter, Inc (“FOSCAS”) is a not for profit, 501(c)(3) corporation originally incorporated in December 2004 to improve the quality of life of the dogs housed in the Watkins Glen, Schuyler County animal shelter. We started by simply supplying comfort items like good quality food, blankets, toys and snacks. We then provided assistance in the development of a foster program in order to help more dogs find forever homes. Our foster program utilized a number of volunteers who agree to take into their homes dogs that have health problems, need additional socialization or simply were overcrowding the shelter. As we grew in volunteers and donations we also started funding vaccinations, spays and neuters, as well as the more specialized veterinary care sometimes needed by the shelter residents. In October 2006 we offered to take over management of the shelter from the Schuyler County Sheriff’s department so we could have more influence over the adoption and euthanasia decisions of the shelter. The Schuyler County Legislature approved the transfer of management to us on Monday May 12, 2008 effective June 1, 2008 for a one year trial period.

During the year that we managed the shelter, the shelter became compliant with the Ag & Markets law and the euthanasia rate dropped to less than 1%. Only two dogs were euthanized during our management cycle due to aggression that could not be overcome. Additionally adoption standards were raised at the shelter to ensure that dogs were placed only in homes where the commitment necessary to own a dog was well understood. Unfortunately, despite these successes, our contract with the county was discontinued effective August 1, 2009. However, we do continue to maintain several foster dogs, adopted to us upon transfer of the shelter back to the county. Please see our “Dogs Available for Adoption” to learn more about them. Accordingly, donations made to our organization prospectively will go principally to the care for these dogs as well as continue to support veterinary care of special needs dogs adopted out of the shelter over the last several years. We continue to stand by the lifetime commitments we made to all dogs adopted out of the Schuyler Shelter during the time that we managed or volunteered at the shelter.

We will be re-grouping in the next six months in hopes of continuing to more broadly help dogs throughout the Southern Tier, including dog owners in Schuyler County who may be turned away by the Schuyler County Animal Shelter or the Humane Society of Schuyler County as well as shelters in the surrounding counties like Chemung and Steuben. We want to thank those who supported us while we attempted to retain our contract with the county including the many foster homes that continue to foster for us and those who wrote letters of support for our efforts as well as those that testified during Public Safety Committee hearings. A very special thanks to Glen Animal Hospital in Watkins Glen and North Shore Animal League on Long Island, as well as Cayuga Dog Rescue in Ithaca, all institutions that believe in and practice a low/kill no/kill philosophy like we did. Regardless of how we choose to re-organize going forward, our low-kill/no-kill philosophy will not change.

My name is Wolfy (now Simon!)…and I am a 6 yr old Samoyed. I have a long story to tell with a happy ending! Read more.