Uncategorized Archives - Seattle Animal Foundation

Welcome to 2025

New year, fresh approach, greater impact

The past year has been one of amazing growth and change at Seattle Animal Foundation, and we’re looking forward to even more in 2025.

As we enter the new year, we’re most excited to lean into our new identity and increase our outreach across the Seattle animal welfare community. Our transition from the Seattle Animal Shelter Foundation means that we can not only continue our strong commitment and support of the Seattle Animal Shelter, but partner with other local animal welfare organizations.

This change brings a new chance for us to get creative about our programs. We can look beyond our traditional fundraising platforms and pull together our community of changemakers to see what opportunities there are to try something new.

A first step toward this is going to be a roundtable of leaders and experts from animal welfare organizations around the area to discuss recent trends, collaboration opportunities and community engagement. The goal will be to generate actionable takeaways to fundraise.

Our new Board President, Justin Taft, will lead this effort. Justin brings a strong background in operations, strategy and community engagement, and is moving into the role recently vacated by Julia Alegre, whose solid leadership supported the foundation through its transition in 2024. Julia is a Seattle tech professional certified in Applied Animal Behavior who was an active volunteer at the shelter for many years and a lifelong animal lover and advocate.

In tandem, the grants team is working on an approach to begin expanding our work with the community. SAF is focused on saving the most vulnerable animals and creating lasting change through community collaboration. The team’s priorities are to continue to support projects at SAS through ongoing grants and to expand SAF’s impact with grants to new rescue organizations operating in King County.

And as always, we will need community support to help when we are ready to execute on these ideas. We look forward to a year of partnership, collaboration and service as we continue our efforts to help animals across Seattle.

President

Posted on Nov 7Nov 7 by Emily Wyatt

Do you love dogs, cats, and critters? Do you also have a passion leadership of passionate people? If so, we have a position for you!

The Seattle Animal Foundation (SAF) is seeking a Volunteer Board President to lead the strategy and day-to-day operations of the Seattle Animal Foundation, a 501(c)3 nonprofit founded in 2010 whose mission is to support local animal welfare organizations throughout the Greater Seattle area to promote compassion, adoption, and prevention. The position is an unpaid position and will require 5 hours of work weekly.

View the full job description (PDF).

Marleen Arenivar

Posted on Nov 7Nov 7 by Emily Wyatt

Marleen works with the University of Washington Alumni Association engaging alumni outside of the Puget Sound. She’s worked in the non-profit sector for 14 years and loves to plan community centered events. She is an avid animal lover and rescue advocate. She volunteers at Forever Home Rescue and adopts 2 pups from their rescue. She enjoys traveling, reading, cooking, walking her pups, and spending time with family. She lives in Seattle with her husband and rescued pups, Sarge and Sansa.

Avery Fukeda

Posted on Oct 13Oct 13 by Emily Wyatt

Avery Fukeda

Avery Fukeda is a seasoned fundraising professional with over a decade of experience in fundraising and events across a diverse range of organizations. His career has spanned sectors including affordable housing, children’s museums, historic performing arts venues, higher education, and social services. He has also had a love for animals and remembers his first interaction was with his grandparent’s corgi in Hawaii.

An active community member, Avery is dedicated to making a positive impact through his volunteer work and philanthropic efforts. He is involved with several organizations here in Seattle and was heavily involved in Hawaii holding various leadership positions. Avery’s commitment to service and community engagement continues to drive his work and passion for helping others.

JJ Lee

Posted on Oct 11Oct 11 by Emily Wyatt

JJ Lee

JJ Lee is a corporate affairs specialist with more than a decade of experience leading PR offices in the U.S. and overseas. She has worked with clients in the tech, philanthropies, and healthcare sectors in communicating their mission and bringing communities together through partnerships.

She is excited to join the Board as a member of the Marketing Committee. JJ has a passion for animal rehabilitation and training. She spends all of her free time gardening, crocheting (mostly likenesses of her dogos!) and discovering new places to eat.

Audrey Jennings

Posted on Oct 11Oct 11 by Emily Wyatt

Audrey Jennings

Audrey is a recruiting professional with over a decade of experience. She has recruited in tech, healthcare, manufacturing, aerospace and is very excited to be helping the SAF!

She moved to Seattle 15 years ago from Chicago immediately becoming a dog walker and sitter for rescues and fosters. She was most recently working with Chewy where she developed a love for pet puns and had the opportunity to volunteer with the Seattle Animal Shelter.

In her free time, she is an avid cyclist, loves cooking and is hoping to travel more. She lives in the Green Lake area where you will often find her asking if she can pet all the dogs.

FAQs – SASF’s Expanding Impact

Posted on Aug 7Aug 9 by JenniferW JuliaL

Since its founding in 2010, the Seattle Animal Shelter Foundation (SASF) has been committed to fulfilling its mission of raising funds to help enrich the lives of Seattle’s animals. As we have grown, that work has presented the opportunity to impact even more animals’ well-beings.

Our generous donors have built SASF into an organization that now has enough capacity to support not only the grants to SAS but also other community-based organizations. Our size and history are an advantage that smaller rescue groups may not have, and we want to further expand our reach.

This change will be effective October 1, 2024. We will also be changing the name of the foundation to Seattle Animal Foundation to reflect our broader mission.

FAQs

What is the new mission statement of the Seattle Animal Foundation (SAF)?

A – Partnering with animal welfare organizations throughout the Greater Seattle area to further their lifesaving missions and empower community involvement, one grant at a time.

Will you still support the shelter and what will that look like?

A – Yes, we are proud of our history of association with the Seattle Animal Shelter and will continue supporting their critical mission. Through our generous donor base we can now broaden our reach and support additional community-based organizations and their life-saving work.

What other organizations will you be supporting?

A – We will open up the grants process to other Seattle-Area based animal support groups starting in October. While we can’t confirm with certainty what specific organizations will receive funding until they move through the grants process, we envision supporting shelter-adjacent groups and other organization’s that provide animal support to the Greater Seattle community such as spay/neuter programs.

What will the SAF grants request process look like?

A – Our Grants Committee is working diligently to ensure that we can scale the grant request and approval process already in place for SAS to include the additional organizations who need our help. We will be sharing more details about this process as they emerge.

What if I want my donation to continue to solely benefit the Seattle Animal Shelter?

A – We can accommodate this request as we have created a separate fund where all proceeds will be earmarked solely for the shelter.

Will the SASF logo, website, etc. change?

A – Yes. We are crafting a new brand that will represent our expanded mission that will launch after October 1. We are excited to share it with our incredible supporters soon.

Are you still planning have the Furevermore Auction & Gala in the Fall?

A – Due to the requirements of the rebrand we are pushing out the Gala to the fall of 2025. We will however be hosting a slimmed-down launch event at Fremont Studios in January and inviting other Animal Support organizations to attend.

Events Co-Chair (Community Events Committee)

Posted on Apr 30Oct 17 by Julia Alegre

Do you love dogs, cats, and critters? Do you also have events and leadership expertise? If so, we have a position for you!

The Seattle Animal Foundation (SAF) is seeking a Community Events Chair to plan and execute events for the SAF and the animals we are supporting. This role has the unique opportunity to plan and coordinate events on behalf of this 501(c)3 organization. The Community Events Co-Chair will collaborate with the Furry 5K and Community Events committee members and will be a member of our 15-person board. This is an unpaid position with a 3-year term. This position will require an average of 3-5 hours of work weekly throughout the year, as we host our own and participate in a variety of community-focused fundraising and awareness events.

The ideal candidate has previous event and volunteer management experience, is willing to roll up their sleeves to plan and execute tasks and is passionate about helping Seattle’s animals and engaging with the community. This animal lover will be well-versed in planning and executing a variety of events, ranging from small tabling events to large-scale extravaganzas. In particular, this individual will also be well versed in and will take the lead on event volunteer recruitment, training, and management and should be comfortable with delegating tasks and leading a team of passionate volunteers. Attention to detail, a can-do attitude, and the ability to thrive in a fast-paced, ambiguous environment are essential elements to this role. The candidate will also work with our fundraising and marketing teams to ensure our donors are well-informed about upcoming events.

View the full job description (PDF).

Upasana Mishra

Posted on Apr 22Apr 22 by Tom

Upasana is an Human Resources professional with a focus on Business HR, Policy Development and Governance. She has worked with different industries within manufacturing, supply chain, sales and non-profit that has helped her in adding different flavors to her HR skills and craft.

Upasana is excited to be leading the recruiting efforts for the Seattle Animal Shelter Foundation.

Outside of work, Upasana is an avid reader and enjoys going on long walks. I am a dog person and absolutely love my furry friends.

Grants Task Force Committee Member (2 openings)

Posted on Apr 12Oct 17 by Julia Alegre

The Seattle Animal Foundation (SAF) is looking for a volunteer (unpaid) Grants Task Force Committee Member to join and support the Grants Task Force team! SAF is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit focused on raising critical funds for animal shelters in Seattle. Our all-volunteer Board of Directors and committees are passionate about animal care and love giving back to our community.

The Grants Task Force is responsible for overseeing the organization’s grants program, including the development and implementation of grant-making policies, the review and selection of grant proposals, and the monitoring of grant awards.

The ideal candidate has a passion for making a positive impact in the community and is passionate about helping Seattle’s animals. This animal lover will be well-versed in the standard Microsoft suite of applications, including Word, Excel, and Sharepoint. Attention to detail, self-organization, a can-do attitude, and the ability to thrive in a fast-paced, small team environment are essential elements to this role.

View the full job descriptions for both below (PDF):