The Red Paw Emergency Relief Team is an emergency services, nonprofit organization run by firefighters that works in conjunction with the Philadelphia Office of Emergency Management, the Philadelphia Fire Department, the American Red Cross, and other public and private disaster relief organizations to provide emergency assistance including search & rescue, emergency transport, shelter, and veterinary care to animals involved in fires and other residential disasters.

Red Paw is on a mission to ensure that no family is forced to relinquish or lose their pets due to a residential disaster. While we keep thousands of families together each year, the sad fact is that too many families are faced with the loss of a companion pet when they are displaced – even temporarily. Red Paw is the only organization in the country that responds to assist families with pets affected by “the everyday disasters”. Red Paw responders, a team of firefighters and veterans, are out at fires and house collapses, searching for and saving missing and injured pets. Each day there are 5 -7 residential fires in Philadelphia County alone and 3-5 additional residential disasters in our service area, which is home to more than 4 million people. Our responders provide search & rescue, medical care, transport and temporary shelter for 3-5 pets per day and, resources, advocacy, support and counseling to 25+ families per week and direct care for more than 1,000 pets per year affected by a fire or disaster in their homes – all at no cost to their family members. With this NRG donation we will train an additional team of responders, invest in a response vehicle for our responders stocked with oxygen masks, search and rescue equipment, and supply kits for families in need. We will increase our network of 24-hour emergency vet hospital partnerships and double our capacity to provide emergency shelter by investing in additional intake space for pets following a fire in their home. Our goal is to continue to increase the number of families assisted each year – a 265% increase since 2012. Funds from this grant will ensure that we can continue to meet the demand.

Please help Red Paw by clicking this link and voting for them to win the NRG Gives 2018 grant: http://nrghomepower.com/nrg-gives