WBZ Cares: 'Shadow Fund' Founders Say Fundraising A Challenge
BOSTON (CBS) - The WBZ Cares campaign is now underway.
Each month, WBZ Newsradio 1030 will highlight a worthy non profit organization and tell the story of what it does for the community.
The campaign will involve news reporting, public service announcements and interviews.
For the month of June, WBZ Cares is profiling the Shadow Fund, which helps pet owners pay for life saving medical treatment for their companion animals.
The fund was created by Law professor Diane Sullivan at the Mass School of Law to help veteran Marine Robert Burke, who planned to quit his job so he could access his 401-k to pay for his dog Shadow's expensive knee surgery.
They've helped hundreds of pets in need since that very first surgery. It's a 100-percent volunteer organization and all of the money in the fund comes from fundraisers and contributions.
Diane Sullivan admits sometimes it can be a challenge keeping the Shadow Fund going.
"We raise money wherever we can. It's not easy in today's times to get the contributions we need to fund the charity. WBZ Nightside host Dan Rea contributes honorariums and personal funds to help the fund and we're deeply appreciative of that."
Sullivan says they rely heavily on donations to keep the coffers full.
"We get personal contributions, but we get far more requests than we ever get in donations. It's a wonderful day when we get a contribution in the mail. Usually they're $10 to $25.00, but occasionally we've gotten large contributions. We're doing some interesting things this year...we're trying a big yard sale." She said.
The Shadow Fund also holds a couple of big fundraising events every year.
"Every April we hold Animal Law day at the MA School of Law. Some of our alumni head up a golf tournament every October. Dan Rea is our celebrity that comes to the tournament every year. That raises about $10,000.00 every year."
Students from the Mass School of Law have also written an animal rescue book, with the proceeds going directly to the Shadow Fund
"We have "Please Can We Keep the Donkey?", it is a collection of animal rescue stories by our law students, who have rescued animals. 100 percent of the proceeds from the sale of the book go to the Shadow Fund. And I've just written a new book on 2 dogs that I rescued, so we raise money wherever we can."