Santa Anita will provide a home for the not-for-proft Free Animal Doctor, which will provide free veterinary surgeries for at-risk animals. Officials at Santa Anita are working with Free Animal Doctor to make the organization's services available to the track's backside community and other community groups at no or low cost.
“There is a need for this type of small animal veterinary assistance locally and nationwide,” said Santa Anita's Aidan Butler, Acting Executive Director, CA Racing Operations for The Stronach Group. “We are well positioned to provide the assistance needed for the Free Animal Doctor clinic to administer necessary care for these precious animals, and we're honored to do so. We've let them know we are here to help in any way that we can.”
Free Animal Doctor (FAD) utilizes Crowdfunding to raise monies for specific pets and provides detailed itemized cost accounting which is directed by each animal's attending veterinarian.
“This serves to self-authenticate the cost of each surgery,” said FAD co-founder Sam Bernardo, who hopes to have FAD's veterinary “bus” fully operational in Santa Anita's parking Lot 7 by Sept. 15. “Once the money is raised for each individual animal's procedure, no additional money is accepted.”
Though a variety of surgeries will be performed, the majority of the procedures will be spaying and neutering of pets.
For additional information and or to contribute to the cost of a procedure for an in-need animal, visit www.freeanimaldoctor.org.
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