Massachusetts Veterinary Medical Association Charities
Protecting and serving the pet communities of Massachusetts.
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
While programs exist to provide assistance for spay/neuter costs, there is no other program in Massachusetts that funds emergency care of stray animals. Oftentimes, Animal Control Officers have to make split-second and often difficult decisions about saving the life of an animal based on estimated veterinary costs. Cities and towns don't have unlimited budgets to spend and for this reason animals sometimes must go untreated. The MVMA Charities’ Stray Animal Fund provides funding for all Animal Control Officers in all cities and towns across Massachusetts to offer lifesaving medical care to unowned animals in their communities. We also promote emergency and disaster preparedness and response across Massachusetts by facilitating and funding training for first responders. Through donations to the State of Massachusetts Animal Response Team (SMART) and Basic Animal Rescue Training (BART), the MVMA Charities helps prepare first responders to save animals in emergency situations.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Stray Animal Fund
The MVMA Charities provides financial assistance for urgent and emergent care of non-owned, unwanted, and unclaimed stray animals. By creating partnerships between local Animal Control Officers and veterinarians, the MVMAC plays an important role in getting these animals the medical care they need. Currently, funds are made available to every town and city in the commonwealth.
Emergency and Disaster Preparedness Program
When a natural or man-made disaster strikes, both people and their animals are affected. In Massachusetts, funds for MVMA Charities' programs benefit animals and their caregivers when they need it most by providing disaster and emergency response, recovery, mitigation and planning, education for animal owners about preparing for disasters, and training for teams about how to respond to urgent events.
A key component of our program is funding for Basic Animal Rescue Training (BART), a training that empowers first responders to be prepared and equipped to address pets and livestock facing emergencies.
Where we work
External reviews
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Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
It is our goal to enroll Animal Control Officers in every city/town in Massachusetts in our Stray Animal Fund so they can take advantage of available money to save stray animals in their communities.
We will also continue to offer BART training to first responders across the state to ensure people and their pets are protected when emergency or disaster strike. We strive for geographic diversity with this program so pets from Cape Cod to Boston, Worcester to the Berkshires, can be saved by first responders in their communities.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
Through our relationship with the Massachusetts Veterinary Medical Association (MVMA), the professional organization of veterinarians across the state, we are able to facilitate partnerships between Animal Control Officers and veterinarians in their communities. We are also working to spread awareness of the Stray Animal Fund by becoming more involved with the Animal Control Officers Association of Massachusetts (ACOAM) through email communication, newsletter presence, and tabling events.
To increase participation in our Emergency and Disaster Preparedness programs, we are enlisting more veterinarians to become trainers for the BART program so more first responders can be trained.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Over the last year we have diversified our Board of Directors. We have included non-veterinarian members who can offer expertise in their fields including marketing and financial decision making. We have developed committees to focus on fundraising, marketing, and governance. We are also working with a strategic planning facilitator to strategize ways to market and carry out our mission.
We expect to increase our fundraising efforts through better marketing, social media presence, and fundraising events so we can continue to fund more stray animal care. With over 1,000 veterinarian members, the MVMA will continue to be an important resource for identifying BART trainers.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
To date, 183 cities and towns have been enrolled in the Stray Animal Fund. We hope to see the number of enrollments increase so we can help more pets in Massachusetts.
Since 2015, 500 first responders in 33 towns across the state have been trained in BART. As we train more veterinarian trainers, we look forward to reaching more first responders in diverse geographic areas of the state.
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Massachusetts Veterinary Medical Association Charities
Board of directorsas of 04/19/2022
Dr. David Schwarz
David Schwarz
Deb Gehrke
Keith Ducharme
Douglas Lober
Emanuel Maciel
David McGrath
Nicole Goldstein
Jacqueline Scanlon
Cheryl Brocki
Kate-Lyn Eadie
Deanna Gualtieri
Board leadership practices
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Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes
Organizational demographics
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Leadership
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Equity strategies
Last updated: 05/29/2020GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.