Pets often left behind as homes foreclose

As homeowners continue to lose their residences to foreclosure, a Valley-based pet rescue organization is forging ahead in the hope of finding homes for furry family members that have been left behind.

Since January, members of the Lost Our Home Pet Foundation said there has been an increase in the number of pets left behind at abandoned homes. The group’s aim is to get them into ones that are occupied where they can be cared for.

Group seeks homes for rescued dogs

The foundation said calls reporting pets in need have averaged about 140 a month since January — up about 20 a month compared with calls in 2008. About half of those calls involve foreclosures, said Jodi Polanski, a mortgage lender who is the president and founder of Lost Our Home Pet Foundation. Most of the pet abandonment is throughout the East Valley, she said.

The rescue group’s mission is to rescue, foster, heal, adopt and advocate for dogs or cats that have been abandoned or left behind due to foreclosure or eviction, and to help families find options other than leaving the pets unattended in the foreclosed homes.

Last year, 23 pets — 15 puppies and eight dogs — were left behind and eventually rescued at one home in Gilbert, Polanski said. More recently, a beagle mix was found abandoned in the backyard of a Gilbert home in the Coronado Ranch subdivision and was rescued, Polanski said.

“It’s been kind of like a revolving door,” Polanski said of the organization taking in the abandoned pets. “Pets are really my passion. We want to help pets that also have been affected by the economy and help them avoid euthanasia. We can’t take them all in, but we take the ones in the most desperate situations.”

Polanski said as people are leaving homes they’ve lost to foreclosure, they are just leaving the pets outside. The pets often are discovered by realtors, she said.

Lost Our Home Pet Foundation, which will reach its one-year anniversary on June 28, does not have an office or facility to house the abandoned pets and solely consists of volunteers who foster the animals until someone gives them a permanent home.

Currently there are about 150 pets who need homes, pretty much evenly divided between cats and dogs, Polanski said.

Overall, the Lost Our Home Pet Foundation has about 35 people who take in the pets, 30 volunteers and 40 who help with food donations. The rescue group also has a financial assistance group that provides money for emergency veterinary care for the pets, and spay and neutering services.

But empty homes aren’t the only places where people can leave pets behind.

Rosie, an orange 2-year-old tabby, has taken up permanent residence on the patio of an apartment occupied by Sarah Moore and her husband, Tracey. The cat, who resides at Country Club Verandas apartments, 1415 N. Country Club Drive in Mesa, now has been abandoned twice in less than a year.

The cat first was abandoned in July 2008 when the family that owned her moved out, and again after the second owner moved about three months ago, Sarah Moore said.

“I think it’s awful,” she said. “I don’t think anyone should be left behind. She was a part of a family, and now, she isn’t.”