Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw

09/11/2025

SAFPAW visited Critter Fixers in Robertson County for the first time on Wednesday. My friend Glenda Kay Sheppard had told me that we just had to try them. And I absolutely trust Glenda’s opinion!

I was very impressed. They have only been open for about a month now and they are smart about it, starting out slow and not trying to offer everything in the beginning.

SAFPAW has been working in the area of spay/neuter for over 30 years so I quickly get a feel for a new clinic and if they have the basics down. Critter Fixers passed with flying colors and I was very impressed. From my first contact over the phone to our first visit, they had not only their process down but they were friendly and very down to earth. This will matter when serving the very pet owners we need to serve.

I expect a professional staff and a veterinary crew that is beyond good. I want a support staff that cares. They have both.

Good job everyone!

Laurie Green
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw

09/10/2025

We need you! We made a great start to painting the inside of our sanctuary but we need to finish this project up. Paint and supplies furnished, we just need painting and trim completed. The rooms that need finishing up are not large.

And we are asking for folks who would volunteer their interior painting skills or at the least give a small nonprofit sanctuary a really good price. We do provide coffee and donuts!

Text me at 615-474-8390 if this is a project you can help us with.

Laurie Green
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw

09/09/2025

Do you need some joy to see you through the week? Meet Mia! She is one of our SAFPAW kittens and her foster, Taylor, is absolutely amazing. I picked Mia up today for her first checkup and 1st vaccine and Dr. Pelletier at Goodlettsville Animal Hospital was so pleased with this little girl.

Mia will never roam the streets hoping for something to eat or struggling with the heat and the fleas. She will never add to our overpopulation tragedy. Mia will only know how to be the sweet kitten with the spirited personality growing up to be a cat.

In a few weeks Mia will be old enough to spay and will be up for adoption! Contact us at safpawnashville@gmail.com if you are thinking about adding ❤️😸 to your home!

Thank you. In a world that is increasingly scary I take solace in the animals that your donations allow us to save.

❤️Laurie
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw

09/03/2025

From my amazing friend Jon Byrd!

I'm hitting the speed limit in September. Turning 70... MPH. We're having a get-together... SUNDAY, SEPT 7 at THE '58 Eastside Bowl 3-5:30PM. Suggested donation is only $10 to join our celebration!

Jon decided to celebrate his birthday by sharing the love and making his day a fundraiser for Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw!

Jon Byrd is one of Nashville’s most amazing independent artist. He is straight up country and I could listen to him sing from a dictionary all night.

I am inviting you to join us! This is a birthday celebration I am counting down the hours until the doors open.

And many thanks to James H. Rubin & Eastside Bowl is graciously helping with the room & the sound!

❤️🎂
Laurie

09/02/2025

SAFPAW needs you but more importantly for the people we serve the need you will be meeting is critical.

SAFPAW delivers Lunch Meals every other Saturday (with increased donations we hope to return to every Saturday soon). However we depend upon volunteers for the sandwiches that we build our lunch meals around.

We ask our volunteers to make a minimum of 25 sandwiches and bring to where we assemble the lunch meal packages on Saturday mornings at 10:00am. We need them wrapped and marked as to what kind of sandwiches they are. And you are free to make whatever kind of sandwich that you would like but feel free to ask us for ideas!

Our assembly volunteers then put everything else that goes into our lunch meals into the brown paper bags and we head out around 12 noon to deliver.

We do not yet have anyone signed up for this coming Saturday, so we need you! Our Lunch Meal Program has been hitting the road since 2020 and I can tell you how important it is to so many that we serve. You may not realize how many in our city and our neighborhoods go hungry but too many do. So in 2020 SAFPAW decided to do what we can do to feed people.

But we cannot run our Meals Program without you. I am asking you to keep us on the roads of Nashville delivering meals to our neighbors who need us.

And to our area restaurants, we would love for you to come on board of this program!

Please contact our Meals Team lead, Lori Eslick if you can make sandwiches this coming Saturday.

Help us to make a difference right here in our city.

Laurie Green
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw
safpawmeals@gmail.com

615-474-8390 (resource line, please text)

08/25/2025

08/25/2025

This past Saturday was so busy and I absolutely loved every minute. And I was grateful beyond belief.

Holly Miller and Carolyn from Hillsboro Presbyterian came out to help our SAFPAW sanctuary with our painting project. They were joined by the amazing Cayley and Leah. These women just showed out! In a short time they were able to get two rooms painted.

I picked out a bright turquoise and terra cotta for the trim and that choice was divine! I wanted something bright and happy. I want everyone to walk into our sanctuary and feel the joy.

And the wonderful folks from Hillsboro Presbyterian did not stop at volunteering! If you look at the pictures you will see that our SAFPAW van was loaded with pet food and with food for our Meals Team. We deliver lunch meals to people on Saturdays and these donations will cover us for several Saturdays!

I wanted to thank our board member Diana Burke for introducing us to Holly and Hillsboro Presbyterian Church.

It truly takes a village and I know that, and I am grateful.

We have a lot more work to do so that our sanctuary will be ready to open up so let me know if you would like to help! Text us on our resource number below.

Laurie Green
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw
615-474-8390

safpawnashville@gmail.com

08/21/2025

We had yet another Spay/Neuter Transport on 8/20, this one to the wonderful Beesley Animal Foundation spay/neuter clinic.

Do you know that our SAFPAW transport has been putting boots on the ground since 2001? Isn’t that amazing? It is because you donated that this has been such a long and wonderful effort. Thousands and thousands of animals fixed and vaccinated, so many that no one would have ever known about if we had not gone down the paths to encampments, housing projects, subsidized complexes and alleys where people found to sleep with their companion dog.

And this is what makes this program so wonderful for me. I stopped to bring back a beautiful cat from the old Tent City to Kelly and Ashley. While I was waiting for Kelly his neighbor was working on a car. He asked me what we did and I told him that we had a transport that picked up dogs and cats and had them fixed, vaccinated and dewormed free of charge. He just stared at me for a bit, then he said that he and his wife had taken in a stray pup but had no idea how to provide him with the veterinary care they knew he needed. Financially they could not afford it and right now they had no working car anyway. I gave him our number and he was going to have his wife get in contact with us.

The power of being out in the community we serve. Connections made. That is what we are all about. And I love these connections.

One answer to our tragic pet overpopulation is a one on one service to the pet owners who need us the most. I know our program works because I’ve lived it since 1998. And I’ve loved every mile we’ve put on our transport vans. Even getting up at 4am and not stopping until dark. Because prevention works, but only if we make it accessible.

Laurie Green
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw

safpawnashville@gmail.com

08/21/2025

“I’m not admitting to anything.”

At a cat sanctuary everyone is a suspect. And the only time a cat looks innocent is during an investigation.

08/19/2025

I truly want to turn our memories into a book. Every path we have walked down, every subsidized apartment we have been to, every encampment we have spent time at has meant so much. Every person and animal we have taken into our sanctuary. For every animal and person we have met along the way, our lives have been changed.

Miller the rooster was one of those memories that makes me smile even as I also remember the frustration. It was before the flood of 2010 when I met this rooster and his people. I have no idea where he came from from and how a rooster ended up at Tent City but I met this colorful rooster as I was delivering supplies. I was not pleased though, as the bowl provided that should have had water in it instead had beer. The claim was that they did not have enough water so I went and bought about 10 jugs of water. The next time I went down there was again beer in the bowl. This time I was pretty mad. I told this camp if they wanted beer 24x7 that was fine but the rooster was to get water only. And that the next time I came down if there was beer instead of water that rooster was mine.

The next time I went down my buddy Malicki was accompanying me on my outreach rounds. He had a Trinity Lane camp and he loved doing outreach with me. And there was Miller with his bowl filled with beer. So I went to get the crate, reminded the camp of our agreement and that my patience had reached its limit. So we left with a rooster who came by the name of Miller honestly.

At the time SAFPAW was using Pet Med and Dr. Mark Girone was just one of those amazing veterinarians you are privileged to work with. So we took Miller there until we could find him a proper and loving home. Imagine his surprise the next morning when the clinic opened and there in one of the runs was a rooster!

And we got lucky. Their amazing groomer, Nancy, just happened to live on a farm. So after about a week of absolutely trying to find a home for Miller but coming up with nothing Nancy called me and said that she wanted to adopt Miller. I was about as happy as I’ve ever been to hear that news!

Many years later Nancy called me to tell me that Miller had died of old age. Sometimes you greet crossing Rainbow Bridge with tears and a smile. I surely did at the news of Miller’s crossing over.

I remembered the story Nancy told me about her husband and Miller. Seems he was working on his truck and had a beer nearby. Miller came flying out of seemingly nowhere and knocked the beer over and started lapping it up. After a few cuss words he picked the empty bottle up and went in to ask Nancy what that was all about. She explained Miller’s story to her husband. She said he walked back to his truck muttering about having to now deal with a rooster in recovery at their farm. I laughed so hard when Nancy told me that story.

Loving people where they are at. Loving the animals we have worked to save. 25 years of memories have brought tears but so many of those memories have brought smiles.

And we still put our feet on the ground and we still serve. And I still love every step, every mile I walk.

Laurie Green
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw

safpawnashville@gmail.com

08/18/2025

This is for today, Monday 8/18.

NASHVILLE:

Extreme Heat! Metro is offering rides from 12PM-7PM today and tomorrow. Please call 615-844-3399.

08/16/2025

I’m going into the deep end with this one but I am just so done with some expectations. And this is about fostering and yes, I’m going to step on some toes here. But I’m just going to dive in and say it.

Fostering saves lives. It does and the number of lives we can’t save because we don’t have fosters is heartbreaking. Rescues call, we post. We beg. And if we hear anything back it is this….”do you have pictures?”

And it would be great if we always had these precious pictures taken with a beautiful and semi-professional look to them. But rescues are drowning. Especially cat rescues, we cannot see any light at the end of our tunnel. So often SAFPAW has people we serve calling to tell us about a momma cat and her litter, can we come save them? So we post, hoping but knowing we can’t get there to take pictures because, well, our day was hell when it began and 10am hasn’t seen it get any better.

I know pictures capture your heart. I know they are important and if we were not in a race every damn day I’d have picture perfect pictures for every kitten and cat we were begging you to foster. But can I ask you something?

If a rescue is asking you to foster a litter of newborn kittens and a sweet young momma why in God’s name do you need pictures? Isn’t the reality of a precious family of newborns and their momma enough to make you open your home?

I think we have all just developed this knee-jerk reaction and we’ve all gotten into the habit. I find myself asking people calling me for pictures, my amazing friends and fosters do the same. I’m not criticizing anyone I’m just begging everyone to take a step back.

It is fair to ask about the vetting they will have before fostering unless this is a dire emergency and we tell you that will happen as soon as we can get them into a vet. It is fair to ask about temperament. If the cat or kittens are feral. It is fair to ask if we will treat for fleas & ticks before bringing them to you. Their approximate ages. How long we may need you to foster.

And too often we do make the impossible happen and get those pictures and still..crickets.

But good Lord if we ask you to foster 3 five week old kittens found in an encampment or in an abandoned apartment please, the time you are asking us to go get perfect pictures is time we don’t have. And why isn’t it enough to say the momma cat is so young, so sweet and her 5 kittens were born 3 days ago? Do we really need to have the pictures before we can say that yes, we will be the home that will take them in and the bridge that will take them across to a new life?

I’m just asking.

Laurie Green
Southern Alliance for People & Animal Welfare - Safpaw