Does your organization have a hard-to-adopt cat? Ann Dunn, founder and executive director of Cat Town, a non-profit adoption center in Oakland, CA, has found a way to place scared, aggressive, old cats into loving homes. Many cats just don’t do well in a shelter environment, no matter how hard staff and volunteers help.

In this five-minute Maddie Talk, Dunn explains that scared and shutdown cats can make a complete turnaround in just a matter of days.

“Different cats need different things in order to feel safe,” she says. Which is why Cat Town has different environments within their adoption center to help cats thrive. With help from Maddie’s Fund^®, Cat Town has adopted over 2,000 cats since opening in 2011.  

Cat Town works closely with Oakland Animal Services, and takes the cats that are the least likely to be adopted. “Helping these cats is not nearly as challenging as we thought it would be. If we come together as a community in support of our municipal shelter, we can help these cats that are being overlooked,” Dunn says. “We just need to take a chance on cats that are stressed and believe in the goodness of our community, knowing that people want to help.”

See how Cat Town allows cats to blossom in this quick Maddie Talk.