Maddie's Fund Grant Recipient

The Maddie's Fund® mission is to revolutionize the status and wellbeing of companion animals.

Maddie's Fund and Northern California Animal Rescue Friends

Northern California Animal Rescue Friends (NCARF) is a proud recipient of a Maddie's Fund Grant. NCARF is using this grant to pay for medical costs incurred for animals (including spaying and neutering) coming into its rescue.

Maddie's Fund

Maddie's Fund®, the Pet Rescue Foundation (www.maddiesfund.org), is a family foundation established in 1999 to help fund the creation of a no-kill nation. The first step is to help create programs that guarantee loving homes for all healthy shelter dogs and cats throughout the country. The next step is to save the sick, injured and poorly behaved pets in animal shelters nationwide.

PeopleSoft and Workday Founder, Dave Duffield and his wife, Cheryl, created Maddie's Fund. The Foundation makes good on a promise the Duffields made to their beloved Miniature Schnauzer, Maddie, to give back to her kind in dollars that which Maddie gave to them in companionship and love. Maddie passed away in 1997, but thanks to this one little dog, abandoned shelter animals have new opportunities to find loving homes in which they, too, may share in the joy and love that Dave and Cheryl enjoyed with Maddie.

Maddie's Fund Mission

Maddie's Fund supports collaborative efforts in which entire cities and counties pool their talents and resources to build a safety net of care for the community's dogs and cats. The foundation awards millions of dollars through multi-year grants to animal welfare coalitions to end the killing of healthy and treatable shelter dogs and cats community-wide. Funded projects must produce an immediate and measurable increase in adoptions and reduction in shelter deaths to demonstrate progress towards the goal. Starter Grants for gathering shelter statistics and writing business plans are available as precursors to community collaborative grants.

Maddie's Fund also looks to the veterinary community to help achieve the no-kill nation goal. Private practice veterinarians are encouraged to participate in Maddie-supported low-income spay/neuter programs to help reduce the numbers of unwanted pets entering animal shelters.

In addition, Maddie's Fund offers grants to colleges of veterinary medicine to establish Shelter Medicine Programs so that the specialized knowledge and skills of these institutions' faculty and students can be incorporated into the effort to save all healthy and treatable shelter pets nationwide.

Maddie's Fund provides special grants to selected leaders who have demonstrated the ability to create change and to save lives; to pilot programs that promise new lifesaving methods; to spay/neuter programs that target problem populations; to organizations and communities that are leading the way in achieving lifesaving goals; and to adoption guarantee shelters that are interested in obtaining new medical equipment.

Grantmaking efforts will continue to focus on organizations that honor the foundation's core values of honesty, integrity and mutual respect.

Thanks to Maddie

Maddie was a beloved Miniature Schnauzer whose unconditional love, devotion, loyalty and spirit inspired her caregivers to start a charitable foundation, Maddie's Fund ®, in her name. The Maddie's Fund mission and purpose is to help the nation's most needy dogs and cats: Dogs and cats who, for one reason or another, have ended up in our animal shelters-homeless, desperate, hoping for a new loving home--and running out of time...

Dave and Cheryl Duffield fell in love with Maddie when she was only ten days old. "We held her in our arms, and loved her immediately," says Dave. "Maddie melted our hearts from the first second we saw her," adds Cheryl. "We loved her sweet ways, her stubbornness, her independence, her intelligence, her spirit, and her devotion."

Dave, Cheryl and Maddie shared ten memorable and happy years together, years filled with walks in the woods, trips to the beach, and good times at home. Dave remembers one particularly good day during the formation of his company, PeopleSoft. Playing with Maddie, he picked her up and made the following promise: "If we ever make some money, I promise we will give it back to you and your kind so others can be as happy as we are today."

Dave and Cheryl are fulfilling their promise to Maddie. They have spent $54 million so far to save dog and cat lives, and have personally given more of their personal wealth to the animal welfare cause than any other individuals--ever. Dave and Cheryl don't want to make a big fuss about their unprecedented personal contribution. But, they do want to honor their beloved dog and the special bond they shared with her.

Animal lovers can understand this sentiment. More and more of us view our companion animals as family, giving them the same care and love we provide our two-legged family members. Our pets enrich our lives with their unconditional devotion to us. They enhance our lives by being a source of stability, love and companionship. The rewards of animal companionship are immeasurable.

The love Dave and Cheryl shared with Maddie inspired them to give generously to help save homeless, abandoned shelter pets in desperate need of love and care. Thanks to Maddie, the dog with the indomitable spirit, these special animals are afforded new opportunities to find loving homes in which they, too, may share in the joy, love and companionship that Dave and Cheryl enjoyed with Maddie.

On behalf of all sheltered dogs and cats, we give thanks to Maddie, whose spirit lives on through the lives her memorable gift has touched.