Protection of Animals in Wakefield Society Inc

OUR MISSION: PAWS is an all-volunteer, non-profit organization founded in Wakefield, MA, in 1982. Our mission is to promote and protect the rights and well-being of all domestic animals and wildlife and foster a greater understanding of animal welfare and animal rights through education.

OUR FOSTER NETWORK: As a shelter-less feline foster network, our animals are cared for in the homes of our volunteers and become loved members of the foster family until we can find the appropriate forever home for each of them. Our adoption team is known for carefully matching pets and people, with the goal of making everyone happy. Should a match not work out, or if an adopter is no longer able to care for the pet, we always find a way to take the pet back into foster care or find other solutions.  We have accepted returned pets who were adopted as long as 10 years ago.

OUR COMMUNITY: Even though our core jurisdiction consists of a dozen or so towns north of Boston, we respond to requests from all over New England.  We have been praised for our quick responses, even when we are not in a position to directly provide a solution for the caller.  Our Humane Response Line team returns messages and emails 7 days a week and links our public to our volunteers to help find solutions for animal-related questions and issues, including inquiries about adoptions, rehoming, animal behavior, low-cost vet care, lost and found assistance, and more.  We make it a priority to help everyone within our immediate locale and we do everything we can to help people outside our area by recommending organizations closer to them and/or other resources to meet their needs.

OUR RESPONSE TO COVID-19: In response to the current food insecurity resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, PAWS joined the MA Pet Food Pantry Task Force.  Our volunteer team has committed to serving several local people-food pantries to ensure they have pet food for their constituents. Discovering that the food pantries in our homeTown cannot accept pet food donations, we opened our Wakefield office to distribute pet food to our local community every Tuesday afternoon, as well as by appointment.

OUR COMMITMENT: We are committed to our animals and to our community because we believe healthy animals are key to the overall health of our citizens and our environment.   Therefore, we continue to strive to offer all of our typical services, while also adjusting services to meet new needs caused by the pandemic.