PawPADs is a 501(c)(3)charitable organization and all contributions are tax deductible to the fullest extent allowable by law.
However, we recommend that you consult with your tax adviser for additional information regarding your contributions.
The following is a listing of some of the expenses involved in obtaining an assistance dog from PawPADs:
Application Fee: $25 (non-refundable; due with full application)
Service Dog or Diabetic Alert Dog Placement Fee: $3,500 (due at PTC)
Facility Dog Placement Fee: $5,000 (due at PTC)
Clients are also responsible for their personal costs associated with attending PTC, including transportation, lodging, food, etc.
Once their dog goes home with them, the client takes over responsibility for care and expenses for that dog, including veterinary care, food, preventatives, and other supplies.
Many friends, family members, employers, schools, churches, or civic groups will often help you raise the amount needed to cover your contribution for your dog.
PawPADs offers scholarships that allow us to place service dogs with qualified veterans who have injuries that occurred as a result of active service up to the amount of the full placement fee.
Since we are a small organization, we get to know our dogs and our clients very well. We are easily accessible to answer any questions or concerns our clients might have throughout their partnership, and the placement fee also helps to cover our travel costs to complete yearly follow-up training.
Finally, when an applicant actively participates in the effort to fundraise to cover the cost of the client fee, they are really building a support system of friends, family, coworkers, donors, church, and other civic organizations that can have their back as a healthy, happy, and successful service dog team for many years!
Partner Training Camp (PTC) is an intensive 12-day training camp where we pair our new clients with their canine partners. During this time, we cover topics such as dog psychology and training, grooming, health, safety, laws, public access, and hands-on experience with your dog. By the end of PTC, clients will have learned everything they need to know about caring for their new partner and how to work as a team to live a more independent life.
During the first couple days of PTC, we rotate the dogs between their potential partners while our staff observes each dog and person’s behavior to help us determine who works well together. It is magical to see the dogs “choosing” their partners!
Typically, around the third day of PTC, we announce which dog will be paired with which client. The rest of PTC is focused on helping the new partners learn how to work well together, public access experience, and everything else they need to know before graduating and taking their dog home with them.
We dual train our dogs for both physical assistance and diabetic alert. Dual training allows us to determine what type of career each dog enjoys most and is best suited for.
Service Dogs: Our physical assistance service dogs perform tasks to assist people with physical disabilities. These tasks include retrieving dropped or named items, opening doors, helping to remove clothing, turning lights on and off, and more.
Diabetic Alert Dogs: Our diabetic alert dogs are trained to detect and alert to both high and low blood sugars. They also signal whether the blood sugar is high or low, can retrieve named items such as juice or a blood glucose test kit, or go get help if the handler is in need of medical attention.
Home Helpmates: Occasionally, we have dogs who have the skills to assist people with physical disabilities or type 1 diabetes but aren’t necessarily comfortable going out in public. These dogs might be suitable for a career as a home helpmate. They assist their partners with everyday household tasks, such as retrieving items off the floor, turning lights on and off, loading clothes in the washer and dryer, etc.; however, these dogs do not go in public with their handlers.
Facility Dogs: We also place facility dogs such as School Resource Dogs (SRDs), Senior Resource Dogs, and Survivor Support Dogs. These dogs are trained up to the level of our service dogs but are typically more social and would do better in a career where they interact with more people on a daily basis. Facility dogs participate in animal assisted activities with and provide comfort to the populations they work with.
A: PawPADs does not train autism support dogs, psychiatric service dogs (including PTSD dogs), guide dogs, or hearing dogs. The only type of medical alert dogs we train are diabetic alert dogs for type 1 diabetes. We do not, at this time, train allergy detection dogs, seizure alert dogs, or dogs who alert to various heart conditions.
PawPADs is committed to using positive reinforcement (reward-based) training. Using positive reinforcement encourages our dogs to want to learn and work, which allows them to become the best assistance dogs they can be.
We do not place dogs in the order that we receive applications, but rather when we have the best match possible. Our goal is to make our clients’ lives more independent with the assistance of one of our dogs. Therefore, we have a very detailed matching process where we do our best to pair our dogs with clients who have similar personalities and lifestyles. Ultimately, the dogs pick what job they want to do, and who they want to be their partner.
Check out our “Release Dogs” page to see the dogs we’ve released from the program and which are currently available for adoption. Maybe there’s a life-long companion waiting there for you!
We train primarily Labrador Retrievers and Labrador Retriever /Golden Retriever crosses in our program. We also work with rescue dogs of various breeds. Since we train for mobility assistance, we need to have medium to large sized dogs to be able to perform tasks such as bracing or helping their partner go up and down stairs.
