Vera Lunda, Coffee County Humane Society dog coordinator, is pictured with one-year-old Pekingese chihuahua Rex at her home in Manchester. Lund said there is no brick and mortar location for the Coffee County Humane Society.
Vera Lunda, Coffee County Humane Society dog coordinator, is pictured with one-year-old Pekingese chihuahua Rex at her home in Manchester. Lund said there is no brick and mortar location for the Coffee County Humane Society.
With one-year-old Pekingese chihuahua Rex by her side, Coffee County Humane Society volunteer Vera Lund shows the area of her Manchester home where she first welcomes rescue dogs.
“This is our unfinished basement that will be finished and this will be kennels down here for them,” Lund said. “I put turf down so at least they feel that they are on grass. They are not down here very long and once I can acclimate them to my dogs then they come live upstairs with me.”
Lund said she has been volunteering with the Coffee County Humane Society since last August, and currently serves as the nonprofit organization’s dog coordinator.
In addition to her own dogs, she currently has three rescues at her home and four in foster homes.
Lund said one of the biggest misunderstandings in the community is that the humane society, which is not affiliated with the National Humane Society, does not have a brick and mortar facility to operate out of. The society utilizes a network of members to board cats and dogs, find them permanent homes and spay and neuter animals. It is also a completely separate organization from Coffee County Animal Control.
Hazel Fannin, CCHS co-president and treasurer, said the Coffee County Humane Society relies on grant funding and the money it generates through pet adoptions to continue to operate.
“Our biggest thing of course, is that we get no money from Coffee County Government,” Fannin said.
Fannin said the nonprofit does not receive any funding from the City of Manchester either, but does get an annual $2,500 grant from the City of Tullahoma that is utilized to spay and neuter cats from the city.
Board member Rosemary Crabtree said another significant issue in Coffee County is animals that have not been spayed or neutered.
“We have a terrible problem with overpopulation of animals,” Crabtree said. Our shelters stay full of dogs, we have nowhere for cats… people will call from all across Coffee County, asking for us to take care of cats in the county.”
While the Coffee County Humane Society will accept cats and kittens, Coffee County Animal Control does not, she said.
Cindy Emanuel serves as the cat coordinator for the Coffee County Humane Society.
“We have very few fosters for all these cats,” Emanuel said. “We get calls every day, morning, noon night-- I kittens come get them.”
Emanuel said it can be an overwhelming, because there is only so much space humane society members have at their homes, but if they tell them they can’t do anything, they are concerned about what might happen to the cats or kittens.
“That is what bothers me,” Emanuel said.
Lund said a lot of the members of the Coffee County Humane Society are longtime members, and she would like to see some younger people in the community get involved with the organization.
“It is what I get back from the animal,” she said. “Animals, they give more than they ever take from you.”
For more information about the Coffee County Humane Society, call 931-728-0903 or visit www.coffeecountyhumane.org.
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