Center That Cares for Pets of AIDS Patients to Expand
Delivery service from West Hollywood to Long Beach was becoming something of a drag. And when hunger was concerned, some clients were howling--if not meowing loudly--over delays.
Service is bound to improve, though, now that a charity organization that helps AIDS patients care for their pets will soon shorten the drive for its volunteers serving southeast L.A. County and the South Bay.
The first of several planned expansions is underway at PAWS L.A., whose workers recently hauled hundreds of pounds of pet food into a storage room in a Long Beach AIDS support center at St. Mary’s Medical Center.
Steve Wayland, customer service administrator for the Southern California branch of Pets Are Wonderful Support, said the new office will make it easier for the organization to help a growing customer base beyond the reach of its West Hollywood headquarters, which opened in 1989. Besides free or low-cost food and supplies, PAWS also provides veterinary care, temporary homes, grooming and daily walks to the pets of more than 1,200 AIDS patients in Southern California. The organization relies on more than 300 volunteers countywide, Wayland said.
Such offerings were more than enough to win the support of Andrew Signey, program manager of Comprehensive AIDS Resource Education, Long Beach’s largest AIDS center, where the new office will open June 10.
“We thought it’d be a wonderful asset for our clients in Long Beach,” Signey said. “Pets provide a wonderful, unconditional love without judgment and without bias that does not always happen for patients who are living with any kind of terminal disease.”
PAWS representatives can be reached at (213) 876-7297.
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