“I’ve been volunteering with Furry Friends for the past 14 years,” Michael says. “I got involved when my wife, Tanika, came home from work one day and told me that we were going to volunteer at an animal shelter. My response was ‘umm.’ Then she said, ‘It’s just petting cats, helping them socialize in order to make them more adoptable.’ My ‘umm’ quickly changed to ‘ok.’  

I have been a Sunday PM Halfway House volunteer since May 2022 and spend from one to two hours there a week.

 My tasks involve feeding and medicating the cats, making sure their rooms are cleaned up and that they have fresh bedding and clean litter boxes. Then I get to enjoy socializing with them (this is the best part), while learning each cat’s unique personality and quirks. My proudest moments are seeing long-time residents being adopted, knowing that they’re getting well deserved forever homes!

“I began volunteering with Furry Friends on May 30, 2024,” says Jaden. “I come in weekly on Tuesdays and Sundays to sweep out the catios, help organize and stock the kitties’ dry and wet food, clean the cat trees, mop and sweep the hallways, and do and fold the laundry. I also help with medicals whenever needed.

“I’ve been a volunteer with Furry Friends for about 15 months,” Connie says. “I got involved when I visited a Furry Friends booth in Camas and learned all about volunteering.

“At the shelter, where I volunteer every Sunday morning with the best crew ever, I work in the blue and green rooms, and help take care of the kitties there, cleaning the rooms and so on. My favorite part of volunteering, besides my work crew, is seeing cats who have been at the facility for a long time finally get adopted: like Caspian, for example.

“Although I’ve only been volunteering with Furry Friends since August of 2024,” Dawnell says, “I’ve been aware of what the organization does for over 20 years.

“I only work part time now due to a rare, invisible disability. Volunteering with Furry Friends allows me to help the kitties in our area and ‘gifts’ me with some much-needed quality time outside the house, which is difficult for me. Right now, I substitute at the shelter whenever I’m needed -- whether it’s once a month or three shifts in a single week – and because I live only a few blocks away, it’s more than do-able.

“I’ve been a volunteer with Furry Friends since September of 2023,” Lance says. “The reason for my getting involved was because I decided that it might be an enjoyable experience to use a little of my spare time to volunteer at a cat shelter. Furry Friends appeared to have a more laid back atmosphere than places like the Humane Society, and so I sent in an application.

Debbie and her family moved to Vancouver in 2016, and one year later, she began volunteering with Furry Friends.

“There was an agency in Vancouver that coordinated and tracked volunteer help for various agencies,” she explains. “I made an appointment to talk to a staff member who showed me a list of agencies requesting volunteers, and I promptly picked Furry Friends, working from between five to six hours a week.

Alli Miller who goes by “Alli Cat” has been volunteering with Furry Friends for three months.
Working at East Padden Animal Hospital as a veterinarian nurse, assisting vets, handling and performing treatments on in/out patients, she heard about us through her job. “Sometimes Furry Friends brings sick kittens in to be seen,” she explains. “At other times, we’ve contacted them in situations where a kitten or cat either needs help or is being surrendered.

I have been volunteering with Furry Friends since August 2023, but I previously volunteered with them for a few months back in 2016 or 2017, when I was still in high school.
Always passionate about animals, I had been looking into some local shelters and animal organizations to get involved with, and I happened upon the website for Furry Friends. I’m so glad I did! 

I have volunteered with Furry Friends since February 2022.I had been searching online for no-kill cat shelters that I could make a donation to. I followed Furry Friends FB page, saw they were seeking volunteers and signed up. I used to volunteer every Tuesday, but since my work schedule has become more demanding, I’m now a volunteer substitute. (I work as a project manager for a fire alarm/low voltage company during the day and am a full-time cat mom at night).

 I have volunteered with Furry Friends for 3.5 years. I was looking for some meaningful volunteer work, and since I’ve always been an animal lover -- especially of cats – it was a perfect fit.

 Retired after a long career in Corrections, I worked with juveniles for eight years and then adults for 27 years when I worked for Washington County. I am a widower and my late wife and I always had at least two cats in our household. Two weeks after I started volunteering with Furry Friends, I met a 1-year-old orange tabby named Cheddar. We hit it off immediately and I took him to his forever home, my condo, and we have been inseparable ever since. He weighed 9.5 pounds when I brought him home and he quickly grew to 14 pounds in his secure environment. He even walked all over the complex grounds with me like a dog, and everyone recognized him and liked him.

I have been volunteering with Furry Friends since November 2023. I volunteer 2+ hours a week and try to help out if they need help with transporting or anything else.

 I had been volunteering at the local animal shelter and found that it wasn’t very personable. Cleaning, caring and socialization were rushed, so I looked around for an organization with a meaningful mission and purpose and discovered Furry Friends. Besides giving love to the cats, I LOVE my fellow volunteers. They are a fun and wonderful group of people who care deeply about what they are doing!

A retired social worker and chef, I have volunteered with Furry Friends since the autumn of 2022. My husband and I moved here from Portland, where I had volunteered with the Feral Cat Coalition of Oregon for several years, and learned about Furry Friends because Linda Rader lives in our neighborhood! Meow about a small world. I have had cats all of my life (there was probably one in my crib), and my husband and I lived with two cats in an RV for five years as we travelled for work.

I have volunteered with Furry Friends for 13 years. When we moved to Vancouver, I wanted to volunteer with a cat rescue and kept seeing Furry Friends when I Googled cat rescues. They were close to our house and a small organization, so it was ideal. I’ve made many wonderful friends through the organization and I’m always happy to tell people about them. I watched them grow from adopting out fewer than 100 cats a year to several hundred cats a year. It’s amazing to see all of these kitties saved and then go to their forever homes.

Although I’ve been volunteering with Furry Friends since July 2023, I had known about them for a while. Then, in the spring of 2019, a neighbor asked for our help with a pregnant stray kitty hiding in their outside vent. We investigated and found a beautiful, scared but very friendly silver tabby, not chipped and either lost or abandoned. FF took her in. Although I’d wanted to volunteer for them then, I wasn’t able to do so. But, after losing several four and two-legged family members over a short period, I saw a FF post for a shift that needed volunteers. The timing couldn’t have been better! Volunteering has helped me work through some very difficult times while helping the kitties. Kitty hugs, purrs, and nose boops are the best therapies ever.  

Sandi Long’s involvement with Furry Friends began in the spring of 2011 when she wanted to adopt another kitty. “The cat I had been interested in wasn’t available, but as I was leaving the shelter a beautiful gray kitty with a white chest and long tail started following me,” she laughs. “When I stopped, he stopped and just stared up at me with his huge yellow eyes.” Sandi decided to sit down on the floor so they could get to know each other. That was the day Sushi found a new home. He is now 16 years old, and sleeps on or next to her pillow each night. A few months later, she adopted a beautiful black Manx kitten from Furry Friends. Vegas is 11 years old and dotes on her brother to the point of annoying him at times!

I have volunteered with Furry Friends on and off since 2010. I started at Pet Smart in Hazel Dell cleaning cages and socializing with the kitties being featured for adoption by Furry Friends there.

 I work several hours a week “behind the scenes,” doing graphic design and website maintenance. I’m currently re-designing the entire website to make it more user-friendly. In the past, I’ve done everything: from working Halfway House shifts in all three locations, attending park events and painting murals to running fundraisers and fostering kitties. (Not only have I designed many of the t-shirts and other merchandise Furry Friends sells, I’ve designed many of the logos that we use for our annual fall auction).

I’m unique in that I volunteer my writing skills to this amazing rescue in Vancouver, WA from my home in Toronto, Ontario, Canada! As for the journey that brought me here?

Words are my passion and were my profession. A journalism graduate from The American University in Washington, D.C., I’m the bestselling author of seven novels, one work of non-fiction, two volumes of poetry, and hundreds of articles. I’ve also been an advertising copywriter, industrial editor and the Public Relations director of a major hospital.

I started socializing at Furry Friends about five years ago. My father’s cat had passed away and I found a cat named Grayson on the Furry Friends’ website. When we came in to adopt him, I asked if they had any volunteer positions, and that’s how I got started. In fact, I started just as Jamie Garver began her tenure as President, allowing me to see all of the wonderful changes being made at FF.

I have been volunteering with Furry Friends since February of 2023. I decided to volunteer at some sort of rescue when I started to “get an itch” to get another cat! I thought that volunteering would scratch that itch and I wouldn’t have to adopt another one. Two months later, we adopted our little girl Rhubarb (previously Phoenix), who joined our 5-year-old Siamese mix named Rosie and our 3-year-old German Shepherd named Juniper.