Win Animal Rescue Grants Measuring the Impact on 5 Freedoms

Your Pet Rescue is organized, and it has a list of grants to apply for. Many grant applications look for very specific information when they open those applications. Here some ways to make yours stand out.

Measure your Animal Rescue’s impact on the 5 Freedoms of an animal’s life. Below you can see the 5 basic qualities that measure a great foster experience.
Let’s put this into numbers to show impact. Here are some ideas that might get your creative juices going.

Going left to right, highlight the number of wonderful homes in your program. If you are hoping to expand into a special needs area, highlight your need for equipment. Focus on your current success rate protecting your current population from the elements and providing comfort. Show your numbers of both inside animals, and how you provided shelter to those who are less fortunate.

Showing impact for providing shelter is easy, but how do you measure a stress free environment from an animal’s perspective? Storytelling is a great way to express an animal overcoming fear and distress. Is there an animal that has overcome great odds that you can showcase as a success story?

Let’s move on to showing the foster animals at their best.  How are you presenting your information about engaging those fosters? Sufficient space and proper facilities to move freely is key. How many events do your rescues go to where they socialize? Have training classes for fosters been invested in? Making sure these animals are presented in the best adoptable state is the answer to grant success. Show how you get them to their best. What systems do you have in place and how do you measure those systems success?

The next section is on disease control and medical care.  We all know showing the impact of a successful spayed and neutered program is important. The PetSmart spay/neuter and preventative care program can help you get your information geared in the right direction. But there are other ailments that you should be highlighting in our grants. What about the number of heartworm cases, accident/abuse victims, or undernourished animals that you have handled successfully? When thinking of these cases think of how far your reach spans. Does your intake come from just your immediate area? Or are you receiving animals from neighboring areas as well? Showing magnitude brings grants.

The last freedom is freedom from hunger and thirst. Feeding fosters seems like a basic task. But showing off the community support can present your Animal Rescue in a vibrant light. Think about how many organizations donate food for your animals? Educating a community as part of your mission is a great way to get noticed in the grant world. Craft a few sentences about what you do in this area.  Here are another reference for more help Quantifying the results of sheltering

When you craft your grant application, use action verbs.  Measure your impact on the animals in your area. Here is a great list of action verbs to help you write the perfect grant.

Taking The Mystery Out of Where to Find Rescue Grant Information

Your animal rescue is going to love the grant ideas you have found. It’s time to fill out the applications, and keep organized for upcoming years.

The First Steps to Finding Rescue Grants has a great system to get you organized to save strays for years to come. 

If you are following that system, you know it is time to tackle the 990 information for columns E, F, and G. 

The 990 is a tax form that tax exempt organizations use.  

So just what is a 990 and what can it do for you?

It holds all sorts of great information for pet rescues applying for grants.  This is where you can get individual names and phone numbers to call if you have questions about the grant … or if you want to contact them for other types of support.  This phone number is located right on the first page.

The list of people that you could call is in part V-A

Keeping this information in a spreadsheet can get you organized for other applications down the road.

But what is column E titled Grant Award Amount all about?  If you think you find that information on the grant application link, you would 1/2 right.   But on the grant application link the grant amount is what they “could” award, or “how much they have” to award.  The 900 lists what they “do” award.

Here is a picture of actual 900 information.  This grant did not award anything over $3000.  So a best practice is not to ask for anything more than that.

You stand a better chance of winning a grant award if you follow this system.

This valuable information is included either as an attachment or on schedule O.  In looking at the full section you can also see if the animal grant is centered around giving money to just 1 type of group, or 1 geographic place.  That might help you weed out applying for grants that you may never be awarded.    So click on this link 900 information, and jump into a 900. 

Make sure you have both selected when you search.  It will make your life a bit easier.

Create a spreadsheet to keep you organized for this year and for next year too!! If you need a refresher on finding grants, visit The First Steps to Finding Rescue Grants.

The First Steps to Finding Rescue Grants

Finding funding for animal rescues is a process. Now that you are financial organized you are ready to look for grant funding. But if you do not have your direct and indirect cost spreadsheet in order, check back to the article Getting a Rescue Financially Grant Ready.

Your goal is to have direct costs and indirect costs in your mind, as well as any trends that you found as you were putting that spreadsheet together. Also be thinking of new programs that you may want to start. You need a list of needs and normal operating costs fresh in your mind. Good grant writing basics calls for having your costs front and center when you get started.

Now it is time to get your grant application system in place. This requires a whole organizational process in itself. Finding animal grants is fairly easy. But finding the right grants for your cause is a bit more challenging. Getting this system down helps take the stress out of filling out grant applications. So let’s get started. The first part of your system is to create an excel spreadsheet with the headings as you see below.

So where to you actually find these grants? Here is a grant writing tip, these links are a great place to start: Grants4.com, Grants for Nonprofits : Animal Welfare, Red Rover Grants for Organizations, Grant Gopher, Helping a Cause 4 Paws.

The second step is filling out this spreadsheet with information from the grant links. This step is time consuming and at times frustrating. Be prepared. You are going to complete columns A through D and it’s time to weed out which animal grants do not apply to your group. You will get to the remaining columns later.

Open up each grant on the lists. As you read through them you are looking for grant goals that match your rescue’s goals. But is more than just looking for the grants that match the breed that you support. You are looking to match up those trends that you have going on too. For example, do you have a growing elderly animal population? Or are you supporting veterinary bills for injured animals? In addition, you are looking for funds to start those new programs within your rescue. For instance, do you need special equipment or a new building to start a new program? Or are you looking to start transporting rescued animals to other states in hopes of getting them into no kill shelters? All of these questions represent different types of grants.

As you find rescue grants that match your needs, fill in columns A through D. Columns E through G are filled out using the information on the organization’s 990. (Link to the 990s We will discuss how to find the information for columns E, F, and G in the next article)

After you have finished with lists in the links, the next place to find grants is to google … Yes, Google. In the search bar type your state’s name and Animal Grants (e.g.  Alabama Animal Grants) then hit search. Repeat the same process of reading and filling out the spreadsheet. Once you get A though D completed, you will see your game plan take shape. You can organize your grant writing time by the application submission dates. And the best part … you are organized for upcoming years too.

Getting a Rescue Financially Grant Ready

Many times when we think of animal rescues, we think of the passion that they have for their cause. We see their exceptional effort that they show to save animals. And when they ask for funding, we see them highlight the success stories with pictures, promoting the impact for everyone to see. But what we fail to recognize is that it comes down to it, animal rescues have a business side too. These groups are leveraging every asset to save animals. Many of these groups have no formal training on how operate like a business. They rely on their passion to bring in donations and figure out how to keep the books on the fly.

This makes applying for grants a dramatic process. So just how does a group get organized?

The first thing to do is to know the direct costs and indirect costs of operating. When researching this information on the web, you will find many generic articles Grants and Guidelines, Indirect Costs: A Guide for Foundations and Nonprofit Organizations.

However many grants will only fund direct costs. So what is the difference?  And how do rescue organizations apply this information?  Look below and see.

Direct cost are items that can be traced directly to an animal receiving the care within the program, like a veterinary bill or a special transport expense. These types of bills can have an animal’s name on it.

Indirect cost by definition cannot be broken down far enough to put an animals name on it. This would include advertising costs, administrative costs, and bills that are associated with fundraisers.

The allocating of costs is a sorting process. This sounds simple, but let’s dig a little deeper. If you track expenses over time, you build a story that you can tell in numbers. You can state over time that your reach and impact have increased. Or you can tell if you have an animal that needs to have their story told because a large vet bill. So, how you sort your expenses can also help tell your story.

But how does that look? Sort the veterinarian bills by animal type. Cats and dogs, can be sent to different grants. And let’s not forget about if you pay for vet care for animals that are in need, but that are not enrolled in your rescue program. That could be a different grant all together… Each sorting category can be a different grant, or a different statement of impact within one grant. Take a look at the spreadsheet below for ideas. Once you adopt this sorting system, you can write grants with ease. And when you are awarded one, you can fill out your reports of funding use afterward quickly.

So let’s save the drama for the storyline. Show your passion, and have the numbers to back it up. Good grant writing is about showing need and impact. With solid a solid accounting system on the front end, you can do both.