The Robert H. Spitz Foundation recently announced its award in 2022 to Indraloka Animal Sanctuary of Dalton.
The $150,000 grant is one of the largest the foundation has ever awarded, and Indraloka is one of only two nonprofits to receive a multi-year grant.
Founded in 2015, the Robert H. Spitz Foundation, which is administered by the Scranton Area Foundation, provides funding for philanthropic programs and initiatives that help children, minorities, veterans, animals and the environment. Indraloka’s educational, animal welfare and environmental awareness programs exemplify the values and work the Foundation supports. The $150,000 grant, which will be paid over three years, supports the sanctuary’s onsite NEPA Rescue Veterinary Clinic.
“The Spitz Foundation was an early supporter of the NEPA Rescue Veterinary Clinic. We are so grateful they shared our vision and invested in this project from the very beginning,” Indraloka founder Indra Lahiri, PhD, says. “This support allowed us to keep moving forward during the pandemic. These funds will help us complete construction, pay for staff and equip the clinic.”
Indraloka rescues animals from the most desperate circumstances. They all need immediate emergency vet care. Getting that care has proven to be one of the most difficult aspects of running a sanctuary. The Spitz Foundation grants have funded, in part, Indraloka’s NEPA Rescue Veterinary Clinic, which provides much-needed vet services to the sanctuary’s animals and those in the care of shelter members of the NEPA Animal Welfare Collaborative.
The shortage of veterinary care in the US began before the pandemic and has snowballed into a dire situation. Short-staffed veterinary offices and hospitals can’t keep up with the need for services. Animals — and the people who love them — are suffering. Pet parents in NEPA often travel to Quakertown or Philadelphia for emergency veterinary care because of the lack of services available in Scranton and the surrounding areas.
Indraloka’s NEPA Rescue Veterinary Clinic, while not open to the public, provides low-cost vet services to animals rescued through the NEPA Animal Welfare Collaborative, which will reduce the burden on all local veterinary offices, clinics and hospitals and increase resources for non-profits who are on the front lines of animal rescue. In this way, everyone who cares for animals in NEPA benefits.
“I never met Mr. Spitz but I thank him in my heart daily. Through his foundation, the Scranton Area Foundation and the many individual sanctuary supporters in NEPA, many, many lives are saved,” Dr. Lahiri says.
