Milam County Communities, I asked what you needed a few months ago, and one of those things was access to affordable veterinary care. Yesterday, we did our first community clinic. We focused on spay/neuter and vaccination, but we also offered just vaccinations, de-worming, heartworm testing (with access to preventative medication), and nail trimming. We have Brinlee Veterinary Services, PLLC, to thank for this. But so many other pieces had to fall into place to make this happen.
We needed a sponsor (or sponsors). It costs us $1000-1500 to put this clinic on, so our sponsors are crucial. In January, our sponsors were Jerman Realty and Thweatt Real Estate. In February, our sponsors were MTOL donors, in March, our sponsor was Ms Ruth Kruse, and in April, Denman Overhead Door and Cameron U-Store-M. We have sponsors lined up for May and June. We’re looking for the rest of the year. The Sponsor(s) get to choose the focus for our event — will it be at one of the animal shelters, in a smaller community, or in one of Milam County’s larger communities like Cameron, Rockdale, Thorndale, Gause, or Buckholts.
Once we have a sponsor and the desired location, we need to find someone willing to let us use their facility. The facility needs to have electricity and a source of running water. During the summer months, we need an air-conditioned space for Dr. Brinlee to set up his mobile operating room and an area for dogs and cats to recover in — we can use fans or Port-A-Cools for that as long as we’re not near the operating room (we don’t want vapor-borne contaminants).
Once you have the sponsor, geographic area, and space arranged, someone familiar with the needs of that community is helpful to have. Crystal Denman does an amazing job of putting these things together, but she will benefit from a volunteer who knows the territory (this involves someone who knows the needs in the community and can help achieve buy-in (and sometimes smaller donations to help that person be able to participate in a low-cost clinic) or maybe someone needs to help transport animals to the event. This is where 4-6 local volunteers are priceless. Our Minerva community knows one another fairly well, and our volunteers were invaluable for working the local landscape to pull everything together. Without them, our event would have been far less successful. I know many of our smaller Milam County communities are equally close-knit and would do equally well in helping us put together a low-cost spay/neuter vaccination clinic in your community.
Ideally, we want to establish a rhythm where each community will be able to count on having a clinic during a specific month of the year.
As a side benefit, we as an organization get to know your community better and we gain a better understanding of your unique needs. With this understanding comes the ability to seek resources to meet your needs.
Milam Touch of Love, with a little help from you, can begin producing big results for your community. Please let us know if you want to make something like the Minerva Snip and Chip happen in your community.
I will approach Thorndale chamber of commerce to see if they might be willing to sponsor a health clinic for our pets.