One thing staff of all animal shelters share is a love for the animals in their care. Their fundamental mission is to provide for wayward dogs and cats and find them new homes. But as most everyone knows, it isn’t easy.
Brittany Jandasek is a Texas State Trooper and part-time adoption coordinator at the City of Junction Animal Shelter, which is located about 300 miles southwest of The Colony. With a city population of 2,500, the shelter had limited resources and infrequent adoption visits when Jandasek started working there in May 2020.
As part of efforts to save the animals in her care, Jandasek began calling other shelters in the hopes of finding some that had room. “I networked and networked, continually receiving the answer of, ‘Sorry we are full, we cannot help,’” she wrote in a recent email to The Colony City Council. “I was ready to give up.”
Jandasek’s last effort, however, connected her with The Colony Animal Services Manager Mark Cooper in October 2020. “Assuming the answer would be another no, I reluctantly reached out,” she wrote.
But to Jandasek’s surprise, Cooper gave her the first “yes.”
“My answered prayer. Mark took our first load of dogs and gave them all medical attention needed and adopted them ALL out within 24 hours of us dropping them off with him,” she wrote. “Mark and his staff - Lesley Langston, Ashley Linton, Alex Eicke, Kelly Hernandez and Ahmad Moore - worked relentlessly to save the animals.”
Since their first encounter, TCAS staff have now saved 42 animals from the Junction shelter, “expecting nothing in return. [It’s] out of the kindness of their hearts and because of their passion for saving animals no matter where they are from,” wrote Jandasek. “My partnership with TCAS has been the life saver of our shelter and I could not do any of this without all of your employees at The Colony Animal Services.”
But wait, there’s more. During winter storms the week of Feb. 15, 2021, the Junction shelter suffered much the same fate as others across the state in the form of power outages and frozen conditions. When Best Friends, a nationally recognized animal rescue group, reached out to TCAS during the storms to ask if they needed any help, the answer was, “no thanks, but we know someone who might.”
Best Friends contacted Jandasek and promptly cleared out the shelter, rescuing 11 dogs and more than 20 cats, which Jandasek and fellow Junction shelter staff member Nicole Grubbs had been caring for in their homes.
“We were shocked,” Jandasek wrote. “This only happened because The Colony Animal Services asked them to call and help us. … Mark and his staff saved our shelter. Our partnership with him has changed our outlook on saving animals and has shown us that there are people out there that care just as much or more than we do.”
For more about The Colony Animal Services and how you can help support its mission, call 972-370-9250, visit TCAS on our website, or follow TCAS on Facebook.