No Animals Left Behind - Help Them Escape Violence

Great news!  We are pleased to report we are already making strides towards our goal of forming the first national task force dedicated to building a social safety net that includes animals, supports people with pets and ensures women can flee violence with their pets at their sides.

On December 5^th and 6^th the Canadian Federation of Humane Societies brought together over 200 people including child protection workers, victim-serving professionals, anti-violence coalitions, domestic violence shelter staff, animal care and control officers, veterinarians, adult protection personnel, law enforcement, prosecutors, academics, governmental and non-governmental agencies and other concerned community members.

From that summit we have already seen;

• A commitment from an Ottawa based women’s shelter to go ahead with providing a space so women, children and animals don’t have to be separated
• Representatives from 8 sectors volunteer to help get the national task force up and running
• A recognition that animal welfare is a missing component in community policing structures called ‘hubs’ that come together to discuss cases that they are dealing with.  Currently they include social workers, police officers, educators and other community members but for the first time will include animal welfare professionals.

The two days highlighted the latest research and emerging concepts, provided cross training in specific skills and explore promising new practices to advance the justice system and social service responses to the links between animal violence and human violence – also known as the Violence Link.

40 years of research has shown that without linking human and animal welfare together we are missing an important piece of understanding how to prevent and address violence against vulnerable populations.

As we begin the work to build a national coalition the attendees determined five issues we need to collectively work on and discussed how to resource and evaluate them.

1. Building a national coalition that includes all necessary people to help move this issue forward
2. Creating a public outreach and communication strategy
3. Providing training to professionals on the link
4. Pursueing adding animal abuse offences into the databases that exist
5. Creating a national system that supports animals in domestic violence situations

Your support is helping us move forward on this vital piece of work which promises to help the most vulnerable whether animal or human!

Links:

• Ottawa women's shelter to welcome pets
• Making the link between animal and human abuse