See the charities that were awarded a $10,000 grant from Hanes

The six organizations featured in the charity badges below have been awarded a matching grant from Hanes. Their stories are inspiring and the matching grants will be a tremendous help in advancing their programs and funding new innitiatives.

Suzanne B.
SAVING GEORGIA DOGS

Suzanne is the president of Saving Georgia Dogs. She saw the Six Degrees matching grant program as a wonderful opportunity for their organization to save many more animals from high kill shelters and gassing shelters in the state of Georgia. The grant from Hanes will help them get a new program called "Save a Heart" off the ground; the program helps shelter dogs suffering with heart worm which is a huge problem throughout the Southern states.

Suzanne thanks Hanes and Kevin Bacon for "helping the little guys like us"; she shares that small organizations like hers struggle to get funding and that a grant like this really allows them to further their mission.

Karen C
DACHSHUND RESCUE OF NORTH AMERICA INC

Karen found out about the Six Degrees matching grants through a newsletter from Saving Shelter Pets [a fellow grant winner]. Karen, a member of the Board of Directors for DRNA, is appreciative that Saving Shelter Pets helped to get them involved. In the end they, the two organizations collaborated quite a bit with their efforts.

DRNA has spent more money this year than in years past on surgeries and as a result that had come close to depleting their funds. They were looking for creative ways to raise more money and doing it through SixDegrees.org seemed like a great idea. Their fundraising included appeals for donations via their newsletter (including special edition toward the end), contacting people who had applied for adoption, a fundraising event and flyers posted in local vets, pet stores. It was hard work, but they kept passing along information through word of mouth -- for example members were contacting their family and friends to widen their circle of potential donors. They got the word out to anyone that would listen. “I really enjoyed it! It motivated me to get up in the morning and see who I would hit up for more donations”, said Karen. She notes that they got into the swing of things late, but they were able to generate momentum quickly

Check out Karen and part of her DRNA team with some puppies in their Six Degrees T-shirt



Jamie M.
SAVING SHELTER PETS INCORPORATED

Jamie is the President of Saving Shelter Pets (SSP) and she was already familiar with the Six Degrees program; they had success reaching hundreds of people during the last round of matching grants, but fell just short of getting the grant in April. They were still thrilled about all the people that helped them raise $17,375; the money was divided among their 4 programs -- Puppy Promises, Bernie's Buddies Heartworm Fund, Rescue & Transport, and Spay & Neuter.

For this round of matching grants, Jamie and everyone else at SSP again put tremendous effort forward to reach out to their community far and wide; this time they were in the top six and will be getting $10,000 to help fund their efforts in Georgia and Ohio.

Susan M
KAT5 Animal Rescue Inc.

Kat 5 Animal Rescue comprised of volunteers from across the country who came together in the wake of Hurricane Katrina to rescue animals. Today, they intervene to protect animals when a natural or man-made disaster strikes. They were successful spreading the word about the matching grant through a bunch of different channels; they posted blog entries that reminded people to donate, they posted appeals on the best friend network and also recruited supporters on their MySpace page.

Susan was thrilled to share the news of the matching grant with their supporters. She explains, "This truly was an effort implementing the theory of the six degrees of separation. We are touched by the swell of support. The money that will enable animals to be saved is incredible, the feeling that you believe in what we do is priceless".

Debra F.
ANIMAL ACTION RESCUE

Debra is the president of Animal Action Rescue (AAR) in Atlanta, GA. She gathered hundreds of supporters through her charity badge to help homeless pets and raised over $17,000. She says, the most incredible of all is that we are TRULY a very small rescue group with only a few core volunteers. We are a foster based group and work in Atlanta and surrounding areas. We take in a lot of special needs animals and this grant could not have come at a better time as we had only recently needed several expensive (many thousands of dollars) medical treatments, surgeries, etc. for several of the dogs we rescued. There really are miracles. AAR is dedicated to the rescue of dogs from high-kill shelters, promote spay/neuter programs, and provide owner education for each dog they place.

Mark F.
MAINE PEOPLES RESOURCE CENTER



Mark is the Communications Coordinator for the Maine People's Resource Center (MPRC). He is clearly good at his job because he was able to spread the word quickly starting on September 4th about their efforts to get the matching grant from Hanes. Their organization's power to mobilize people is a hallmark of their work and they did just that. They posted a page called the "Power of $10" where they encouraged people to donate $10 to help MPRC.

MPRC’s ability to mobilize people and communities traditionally shut out of decision-making processes is a key characteristic of their work. They excel at teaching people new to the process of public policymaking how it works and how to best impact the process. They are the publisher of the highly regarded A Citizen's Guide to the Maine Legislature, currently in its twelfth edition. The grant will help them bring individuals and organizations together to realize their shared goals in organizing for a better Maine.


Check out Mark and his team in his Six Degrees T-shirt