ANIMAL GUARDIANS HORSE RESCUE INC

In working together as an Adoptions Partner with the Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Bernadino County Departments of Animal Care and Control, we are aiming to accomplish a greater reduction in equine abuse, neglect, abandonment, and surrender to the County Shelters. In working as a Member of The Homes For Horses Coalition, we are aiming to raise the bar for standards of rescue, rehabilitation, rehoming, and retirement sanctuary programs in southern CA and nationwide. In working as a Member of the Humane Society of the United States Safe Stalls Network, we are aiming to develop high quality programming and a high standards of excellence for equine retirement sanctuary placement. We are constantly striving to learn and develop, and grow professionally and personally, to learn more about equine welfare at large and public education / outreach for positive equine-human relations. We want to be verified and accredited by The Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries one day in the future. We are aiming to get our own larger ranch rescue property.

Our organization has been working on program development over the past 8 years. Some of the strategies we are using to try to accomplish a larger goal of becoming verified by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries are: 1.) Develop a larger and stronger Board of Directors with more diverse populations chairing various committees for business development, 2.) Research programs with interest in developing an equine emotional therapy program for wounded United States Veterans, 3.) Maintain active status in the HSUS Safe Stalls Network Program, the ASPCA Horse Action Team and The Homes For Horses Coalition, 4.) Educate our members at The Homes For Horses Coalition Conference and through varied Clinics, Webinars, and Professional Development Trainings, 5.) Apply for grants to continue our growth and development, 6.) Partner with The Parelli Foundation to promote natural horsemanship education and help train our volunteers, foster caregivers, adopters, and the public, 6.) Partner with the L.A. County Animal Care and Control Department, Agoura Hills Animal Shelter to promote the ASPCA National Help A Horse Day and bring in equine specialists to educate the public and promote adoptions, 7.) Participate from 2014 - 2018 in the Humane Society of the United States Forever Foundation Training Program with Carter Ranch to train and prepare our volunteers and fosters to assist in rehabilitation training for adoption promotion. 8.) Participate in the Parelli Foundation Natural Horsemanship Education Grant Program providing training and education to community members in natural horsemanship training and positive / effective communication with horses; working with Maurice Thibault and Susan Nelson-Thibault, professional Parelli Natural Horsemanship Trainers.

We believe that our organization is capable of attaining verification / accreditation status with the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries in due time. However, we need to purchase a larger piece of property to house all rescue equines on one location in order to do this. Financially, this has been a very difficult task in Ventura County, CA. In the future, we will move forward with this and hope to move the rescue to San Diego or San Luis Obispo County, CA. But it may take some time to get there.

So far, our rescue has accomplished many things which we are proud of. We have attained Platinum Seal of Transparency status with Guidestar. We have won a small natural horsemanship education grant from The Parelli Foundation two years in a row. We have attained Top-10 Charity status with GreatNonprofits.org. We have attained and retained Adoptions Partner Status with Ventura, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and San Bernadino County Animal Care and Control / Animal Services. We have attained and retained active Member status with the Humane Society of the United States Safe Stalls Network, the ASPCA Horse Action Team, The Homes For Horses Coalition, and we have participated for 4 years in the HSUS Forever Foundation Training Program. We are proud of our wonderful new website that we created last year www.animalguardianshorserescue.org. We are proud that we have rescued and rehabilitated 73 equines from miniature to 16.3 hands, within the past 12 years. We even rescued and rehabilitated a sweet senior bull dog mix. We are proud to have partnered with Humanity For Horses Sanctuary, Sadies Haven Sanctuary, the T.S. and J.D. Glide Foundation, and Castleton Ranch Sanctuary to place horses with special needs from the county shelter programs to avoid euthanasia. And we are proud to have collaborated with The Homes For Horses Coalition to have rescued 3 sanctuary horses from a large scale sanctuary closure in Oregon in December 2017. Overall, we are proud of our accomplishments and feel passionate about what we do and who we are.