Elli Frank, founder and executive director of Mr. Bones & Co., joins Cheddar News to discuss Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Month and inspiration behind her nonprofit.

Between Bells

How Nonprofit 'Mr. Bones & Co.' Helps Vulnerable Pets Find Forever Homes

join me on a day in the life of adoptable Bella Bean Bella loves to sleep, so we wake up slowly and with belly rubs, she takes her breakfast in the garden, she loves this capable and that helps her foster mom with work before speaking up for her morning nap next she goes on a walk or takes a nice sniff in the garden and works up an appetite for a crunchy snack, she always, always makes time to be silly and then it's dinner time, which she loves foraging for in her toy box, I love Bella beans, so cute! So using social media to highlight adoptable pets, Mr bones and co aiming to get vulnerable pets adopted and into safe forever homes. However, this month is widely recognized by many national and local organizations as a time to renew awareness when it comes to animal cruelty and the nonprofit organization founded back in 2013, aiming to help again this year. So joining us now to discuss Ellie frank, founder and executive director of Mr Bones and Co L is such a pleasure to have you here. First off, oh my God Bella being so incredibly cute, Isabella been still available to adopt for our viewers at home, who just saw that she is absolutely still available to adopt and definitely looking for her forever home. Alright, so like we mentioned april dedicated to raising awareness when it comes to animal cruelty. So let's talk about how important it is for you to sort of help bring awareness to this month, to let people know that this is happening, it's so important because just highlighting it, highlighting the fact that there are so many animals in need and cruelty is not just a thing that you hear on the news that's happening in your own backyard, but you can do something about it. Just drawing attention to that and reminding people that it's so easy to make such a big difference in someone's life is so important. Absolutely. And all of us who have rescued our you know forever pups have our own sort of his stories throughout all of this. Your story behind your company is really sort of fascinating Mr Bones and co because you named it after your adopted dog. Mr Bones who sadly is no longer with us anymore. But how did your journey of going through the adoption process sort of get you to where you're at here with this company here sure adopting Mr Bones completely turned my entire life around, changed my whole trajectory and did a complete 1 80 it was something that I just wasn't ever expecting. I um you know sort of lived that new york city life where I was doing events and going out at night and had adopted a dog from another animal shelter called Animal Haven and sort of just woke up one day and was like I need to change something. Um let me go in this direction and um I I didn't know what the at risk list was. I didn't understand a municipal shelter, I didn't understand how much they rely on the community for support. And I went down there to pick this dog up and he was emaciated and sort of like the walking dead to me and then to just see his metamorphose and his growth and has changed just in the first month and to realize the impact that I made on this one little life just gave me a complete feeling of this is like I gotta do something and um everyone has something that they can do and this is going to be mine and so fast forward. I think 10 years later I'm crazy dog lady and here I am. Listen, I get it. I mean I adopted my dog martin and I feel the same way that this is me and martin right here, which is so cute. He's like the cutest guy with the half jaw, he's just like loving his life and by the way for our viewers at home, if you scan that QR code you see on your screen, it'll actually take you to a page where you can also adopt available pet as well. Ellie, let's talk about the journey that we've seen in terms of the legislation, that legislative efforts, especially in states like New Jersey, They have proposed legislation that would reduce the financial burden faced by a lot of these animal shelters in their state. It would also expedite the road to recovery for a lot of these vulnerable pets as well. So how important is the legislative aspect that these states are trying to implement, important in terms of the rescue efforts here, changing animal cruelty starts with legislation. So the more we mainstream this, the more we normalize our efforts to help animals and to, to encourage our lawmakers to force the people that are hurting them to face repercussions, to pay restitution to the animal is so important, shelters and rescues carry such a heavy financial burden. And we can't do this without laws being put into place, making people hold held accountable for their actions. They always say, you know, they, but if you really want to get somebody to stop doing something that is wrong, you have to unfortunately hit him where it hurts. Um, and a lot of people that's their wallet. So if you make people accountable for the veterinary and the behavior training and all of the costs incurred in saving these animals lives, maybe there's going to be less people that are going to be hurting them because the repercussions are so high because right now, um, I feel like people, people just do whatever they want because they can get away with it. We signed the pandemic, a lot of the shelters were out of dogs, which was one of the best stories I've heard in a while, but the problem is, is now those shelters are full all over again. Ellie what are some of the main challenges of getting these pets into these safe forever homes here? The main challenge? I think a lot of it is people believe there's a stigmas facing shelter dogs and rescue dogs especially the adults, the black ones, the pit bulls, the ones that have been there the longest and they are some of the most ridiculous stigmas that I have ever heard of. Um And it is it's really just education and getting people to understand even something so simple as telling your neighbor to spay and neuter their dog if they haven't already. Um will help stop the problem encouraging people to understand that every dog is an individual. It does it is not how you raise them, it is how they're born. It is a combination of nurture and nature and we have seen some of the most horrific cases come through our program dog fighting, just everything you name it and they're great fully functioning family friendly pets because every dog is an individual and we don't judge people by the some of their past. So why would we do it to an animal so well said and thank you from dog lovers across the world for all the great things that you're doing. You're literally doing God's work here. Ellie Ellie frank founder and executive director of Mr Bones and co thank you so much for joining us