The Daily Agenda: It's a dog eat dog world
Money can't buy everything ... A local dog rescue is learning that the hard way ... Excitement for the DNC is building.
A local dog rescue that’s brought in close to $2 million over the past several years is closing its doors, leaving the fate of the dozens of dogs in its care in limbo.
Lucy’s Hope Sanctuary and Rescue launched as a nonprofit in 2019 and started pulling dogs from PIma Animal Care Center’s euthanasia list early into the pandemic.
A few years later, Lucy’s Hope owner and operator Behzad “Ben” Garagozloo was featured in a story by KOLD about his plans to build a state-of-the-art sanctuary for shelter dogs facing euthanasia.
Garagozloo told KOLD that he’d purchased a 20-acre property in 2019 solely for the rescue, but due to a lengthy selling process and the pandemic, had just finally begun work on phase one of his plans.
“There’s kind of a niche for this type of rescue, because of all the responsibility, expenses and everything else that comes along with kind of rescue of doing behavior dogs and more high-risk type of dogs,” says Garagozloo. “There’s not a lot of rescues that are doing them. So I wanted to provide a service to the community to help and give back in that sense.”
But by last August, Garagozloo was making headlines for very different reasons, after Lucy’s Hope listed a dog for adoption that volunteers and staffers say had bitten off the finger of its owner’s elderly mother.
Garagozloo told KVOA that “although dog bites happen and are significant and an issue, there's also context behind every bite” and said he believes the dog “is different after spending months with a professional trainer.”
He talked again about his plans to build “a true sanctuary where dogs that don't get adopted can live a decent life.”
But the sanctuary as he pitched it never happened, according to several former staffers, who took to social media in June to announce the rescue’s closure and try to help find homes for the upwards of 45 dogs still in its care.
Lucy’s Hope has not publicly confirmed the closure and did not respond to Caitlin’s request for comment, but several people with knowledge of the situation said Garagozloo received notice from its accountant in May that it only had funds to stay up and running for a few more months.
But tax returns, which nonprofits are required by law to disclose, show that between 2020 and 2022, Lucy’s Hope took in a combined $1.7 million in revenue, reporting small profits for its first two years and netting a $50,000 loss in its third.
Lucy’s Hope reported $247,500 in revenue in 2020, according to tax returns. It more than doubled its revenue the next year, reporting $623,831 in contributions and about a $5,000 profit.
But by 2022, the financial situation had taken a turn. A tax return filed last November showed that Lucy’s Hope brought in $838,816 but spent $889,772, resulting in a deficit of more than $50,000.
Lucy’s Hope hasn’t filed its tax return for 2023 yet, but for the purpose of comparison, we checked out the most recent tax returns for four other local rescues.
Three of those rescues reported incomes of less than $50,000 on their most recent returns, and the fourth reported just under $74,000.
Former Lucy’s Hope staffers who spoke to Caitlin (and asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation) said Garagozloo frequently pulled dogs from PACC and other sources before lining up a foster family for the dog to live with, which led to overcrowding and eventually, a large backlog of dogs seeking homes.
One employee said that when they started working for the rescue last May, it only had about 20 dogs in its care and wasn’t an “overcrowded disaster.” But that changed, as Garagozloo continued to pull dogs without first arranging placement.
With the sanctuary’s facility full, many of these dogs ended up in boarding and some for several years, which the former employee said came at a considerable cost and made the dogs more difficult to adopt.
“Management told him to stop, because they were just sitting in boarding,” the employee said.
Tax records show that Lucy’s Hope pulled 48 dogs in 2020, 118 dogs in 2021 and 77 in 2022.
The 2022 return says that Lucy’s Hope spent more than $186,000 on “specialty board and groom,” but doesn’t provide a breakdown.
Lucy’s Hope’s spent more than $600,000 in 2022 on “welfare services” for the 125 dogs in its care, according to the return, which noted that the group began operating out of a “new facility” in 2022. But it wasn’t the state-of-the-art facility Garagozloo had pitched to KOLD and donors.
“Instead, Ben bought expensive sheds and started shoving dogs in there,” one former employee told Caitlin.
While things were far from perfect, staffers said that the situation at Lucy’s Hope quickly started to go downhill in February when the management team was fired.
With no one to put in the time to find homes for the dogs in the group’s care, one former employee said Lucy’s Hope went a full three months without a single adoption.
The situation peaked in May, when a story began circulating about a dog in the group’s care who developed sepsis and had to be euthanized, prompting people previously associated with the group to start sharing stories of their own on social media.
The group has been active on social media over the past month, posting frequently about dogs in “urgent” need of homes, but it’s also been posting regularly about successful adoptions.
But it’s unclear how many dogs still need to find homes and how much time Lucy’s has left.
Experts say that the abundance of private breeders and commercial pet shops prove challenging for rescue groups, with data showing that pet adoptions have steadily declined over the past five years while shelter intakes have increased.
“Rescues in (Tucson,) and across the country, are trying their best to save lives, but need more help from the community to step-up by fostering or adopting,” Jessica Gutman, a senior strategist with Best Friends Animal Society, wrote in an email. “Nobody wants to see dogs stuck in boarding or intends that for their rescue.”
But this trend can be reversed, Gutman said, adding that it wouldn’t even take a significant societal change to move the needle.
“If just 6% more people chose to adopt instead of purchasing a pet, we could stop the killing of cats and dogs in America’s shelters,” Gutman said.
Par for the course: Hannah Cree joined Zac Ziegler on the latest episode of Arizona Public Media’s water podcast Tapped, to talk about the debate over golf courses’ role in the water crisis. With more than 300 golf courses in the state, Cree and Ziegler examined 10 years worth of water usage records to try to get a feel for the environmental and economic impact of golf. Data showed that the total acre-feet used by golf courses over the last 10 years across the whole state has gone down, most significantly in the last three years.
Paying it forward: Café 54 is celebrating its 20th anniversary with a year of festivities, This is Tucson’s Jamie Donnelly writes. The restaurant employs people who are recovering from mental health problems or substance use issues, giving them the opportunity to build community while holding down a steady job. Café 54 is owned by Coyote Task Force, a nonprofit that provides jobs and recovery assistance to people living with mental illness.
Looking to the future: Plan Tucson is holding office hours for community members in advance of the nexxt phase of planning, KGUN reports. Plan Tucson, the city’s general plan and roadmap for Tucson’s future, will be put to voters for approval next fall. The city updates its general plan every 10 years, using it to inform decisions about land use, growth and future projects.
Party time: Pima County Recorder Gabriella Cázares-Kelly is excited for the upcoming Democratic National Convention, where she’ll be appearing as a delegate, the Associated Press’ David A. Lieb writes. Cázares-Kelly said the event “feels like a party” and she’s interested both personally and professionally, since her office has just two months left before ballots are mailed to overseas voters.
“As an Indigenous woman, watching a Black woman — woman of color — advance to the highest office in the country, it is very exciting,” she said.
On the docket: The family of a Flowing Wells student who was killed when she was crushed by a school gate last fall have filed a wrongful death suit against the district, the Arizona Daily Star’s Prerana Sannappanavar reports. Ariette Chavira’s parents previously filed a $15 million wrongful death claim in April and are accusing the district of negligence and carelessness in the lawsuit, which was filed Monday.
Dine and discover: The Marana Chamber of Commerce and Discover Marana are challenging the community to support local restaurants and food-focussed businesses during the slow summer months, Tucson Local Media’s Karen Scaffner reports. Through September, people can earn locally designed Marana merchandise, including Christmas ornaments, hats and glassware, by visiting four participating local businesses.
$269,300: The amount of money Lucy’s Hope spent on veterinary care in 2022, according to tax returns.