APAW

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Eat Tacos to Help Build a New Animal Shelter

2025 ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT

Amelia Patrons for Animal Welfare, Inc. (APAW} will hold its annual organizational meeting on Sunday, March 23rd, at 2:00 PM at the County Administration building conference room. All interested people are invited to attend.

The Blessing of the Animals 2024

APAW Donates Adoption Bell to Amelia Animal Shelter

AMELIA COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER ADOPTION BELL DONATED IN TRIBUTE TO BILL AVERETT, CO-FOUNDER OF APAW

Amelia Patrons for Animal Welfare, Inc. (APAW) members presented an adoption bell to the Amelia County Animal shelter on Saturday, December 30^th in honor and memory of Bill Averett, one of the founding members of APAW. The adoption bell is mounted on a plaque engraved with a tribute to Bill and will be wrung with each adoption of an animal from the shelter. The bell will be hung on the shelter’s “adoption wall” with pictures of pets successfully adopted from the shelter into their forever homes.

In 1993, after Bill first saw the Amelia County animal shelter, he was shocked and dismayed at the poor facility. At that time the small cinderblock building located at the former county landfill behind Amelia Lumber Company, Inc. had only 3 small indoor/outdoor runs with no heat or air conditioning, no office or bathroom and a wooden box used as a gas chamber for euthanization. Visibly upset, he stated “Someone should do something about that.” When challenged that HE could do something about it, he took it on as his mission. Bill called and met with county leaders, animal control personnel, local veterinarians and other concerned citizens. As a result, the Board of Supervisors (BOS) appointed a committee consisting of Bill Averett, Susan Schurz and Dr. Edda Eliasson to research plans for a better solution to the current animal shelter. After many visits to other shelters, networking and recommendations by the committee, the BOS chose to build the current animal shelter in 1996. Although the current shelter has now outgrown its needs, at the time it was a huge improvement for the housing of lost and abandoned animals.

The committee of 3 then recruited other interested citizens and formed Amelia Patrons for Animal Welfare, Inc. (APAW) a non-profit 501©3 charity that continues its work for homeless pets. In the almost 30 years of its existence, APAW has saved, fostered and adopted out countless animals, provided spay/neuter assistance to thousands of pet owners, provided over 60,000 pounds of pet food to needy pet owners and supported the animal shelter by purchasing thousands of dollars worth of needed equipment and supplies. For more information about APAW visit www.apawinc.org.       

Effective October 1, 2023, APAW will be offering spay/neuter assistance vouchers to Amelia County residents ONLY!!

Effective October 1, 2023, APAW will be offering spay/neuter assistance vouchers to Amelia County residents ONLY!!

Change Coming for SPAY/NEUTER Assistance

Due to diminishing funds, effective October 1, 2023, APAW will offer spay/neuter vouchers to Amelia County citizens only as well as continuing to provide vouchers for animals adopted from the Amelia County Animal Shelter regardless of adopted pet owner’s residence. Please plan accordingly.

PET FOOD DONATIONS NEEDED

Amelia Patrons for Animal Welfare, Inc. (APAW) saw a need in their community and stepped up to provide pet food for food insecure pet owners beginning in 2008. Since then, APAW has provided over 50,000 pounds (over 25 tons!) of pet food to the local USDA Food Pantry, Amelia County Christmas Mother’s program, the Amelia County Animal Shelter, the Southside SPCA, other food banks and individual citizens.

These donations have been made possible by APAW’s partnership with the Amelia Food Lion (thank you Tammy Banks), the Amelia Dollar General (thank you Cindy Moore), and the many devoted and loyal APAW supporters.

Food Lion and Dollar General donate their broken bags of dog and cat food to APAW. APAW volunteers then repackage the pet food (thanks to Kroger for providing the paper bags) and deliver the food as needed.

APAW and the Amelia County Animal Shelter welcome all donations of pet food, cat litter and monetary donations (please make checks out to APAW) to help keep this program going. Recent improvements in pet food packaging have drasticlly reduced the amounty of broken pet food bags and therefore the amount of pet food that we receive. If you have questions about this program or would like to donate, please contact the Amelia County Animal Shelter at 561-3878 or APAW at apawinc@gmail.com