Can somebody please tell me why the NFOA offers "free" spaying and neutering for strays but then they make you pay a 60 dollar pet adoption fee?

A friend of mine had a cat show up on their balcony and then she dropped a litter of 4 kittens. He went to go check about the "free" spaying and then got told that if somebody wanted one they would be forced to pay the 60 dollar adoption fee. If that was going to be the case just tell everybody that is going to cost 60 dollars.

Sorry I will get off my soap box now.

I don't know what NFOAs situation for spaying/adopting strays and pets but I have worked with a local vet located not far from the SS who offers free "spay a stray" days as often as donations will allow. I have taken a number of strays from around our house out in town. I try to leave a sizeable donation so they can cover their costs and I have paid to have cats I've adopted sterilized there partly because it can be impossible to get into the base vet and so that I can support the work they do.

Check out their website

http://legaproanimale.org/home

and go to the NEWS tab where they have info on the work they've done around Naples and around Italy in general. You can put down a deposit for a live trap if you need them to bring in feral cats. You also need to call (they speak English) and get on a list to 'reserve' the number of cats you are bringing in since they have a maximum number of surgeries they can do.

They also have volunteer opportunities if people are interested or if you just want to donate to support their work to sterilize stray animals.

Hello, my name is Whitney. I am the current president of NFOA. I just wanted to clear up any misunderstanding for you. Fist off, we do not "force" anyone to pay anything. It is their choice to adopt the animal. We do not offer free spay/neuter. Well, let me rephrase. It is not free for us. We offer the community help with medical costs if they decide to pick up a stray and help care for it.

We have accounts with two vets in town. One being the Lega Pro Animale, that Janice listed above. Another being Dr. Damiani's clinic, who also works at the base vet a couple of days a week. We offer 1/2 off coupons to people in the community where they pay for half, and we pay for half. And this is at our costs with the vet. In some situations, we do pay the full amount.

We also pay for medical costs of sick, injured, and malnourished animals that the community takes in.

The adoption fee is a fraction of our vet bills, I assure you. We only ask for the adoption fee to help put money back in the account to pay for more animals to be cared for. Our vet bills run literally thousands of euro a month in the peak puppy/kitten season.

The above vet, Lega Pro Animale does offer a free spay day every other month or so. But it is more for the Italian community. They will take ours if there is room but that is not very often.

I hope that this helps clear up why we charge an adoption fee. Also, please, if you have any questions on why or how we run things, feel free to contact us via email. All of our email addresses are on our website, naplesfriendsofanimals.org. Thank you.

Jeremy, I could not help but comment on this. If someone is having difficulty paying a $60 adoption fee then that someone should not be thinking of adopting in the first place. Pets can be expensive. I think you need to separate the adoption fee from the spay/neutering, these are two different things. Paying to adopt (in my opinion) lets one know how serious someone is about getting a pet in the first place. By handing pets out for free encourages people to get these poor animals as a temporary fix until they move on and decide to dump them (not saying you are one of them) we see this all too often. NFOA do have tremendous amounts of debt at times owing to local vets due to the care and support they give these animals and they do this on a voluntarily basis (no pay to them at all) Thrift store has opened many an evening to raise money to pay these bills to local vets for the good work NFOA does. $60 is nothing for a life long friend

My problem is not with paying the fee. My problem is that there is somebody telling others that the NFOA gives out coupons to have stray dogs and cats neutered/spayed. If this is not the case then said individual should not be telling people that. I have no problem paying to have a pet neutered/spayed as that is what I am doing because I did not want to have to deal with the NFOA, after all the crap they started in Security.

Cheryl, Thank you very much for your comment. It is a very true statement and one we are very clear about at adoption days.

Jeremy, I am sorry that you have such problems with our organization and that you feel we have somehow wronged you. We do give out coupons for stray animals. Maybe I did not explain correctly in the above post. We offer half off coupons to the community for spay/neutering of spays with the agreement they will have the animals adopted through us. This is not only for the adoption fees but also for the screening process and the adoption contract. There are many reasons beyond the money. I also want to added a comment about your comment above.

"I have no problem paying to have a pet neutered/spayed as that is what I am doing because I did not want to have to deal with the NFOA, after all the crap they started in Security."

I am sorry you feel you cannot ask for help. And I am sorry you have such a sour taste for us. But just to be very clear, the "crap they started with security" as you call it was NOT NFOA. I want to make this very clear. That was done by two people that also happened to be NFOA volunteers. They do not, in any way, speak for our organization. They have both since resigned. I also want to offer to you, that if you have any questions or concerns about our organization, feel free to email me directly or come to our next adoption day on Saturday, December 12 and talk to us. Thank you.

I think that NFOA is a great organization with wonderful intentions. I think policies and guidelines can use some attention to detail. I also feel that a few past volunteers may have obscured the overall mission. I can't begin to stress my love for animals and the way my heart breaks passing dog after dog after dog daily! I too was miss-led by NFOA, but I believe I was caught in the middle of a volunteer turn-a-round Ultimately, I know it's all for love of the animals. Logistically, the dynamics could be tweaked.

Cheryl is right by charging to adopt an animal it "hopefully" does encourage people to keep their pet, that they are serious when adopting and not looking just for a 2 year fix. I do believe NFOA does give out coupons so the folks adopting can get their animal fixed, then the NFOA pay the vet bills with the money earned from adoption day. They also pay for a lot of strays abandoned by people and not had there animal fixed and to keep down the population of feral animals. I have seen the vet bills and they are HUGE.

I would love to see the C/O "or" who the powers that be? track down the people who have left animals behind and fine them. Those fines then could go to the re-housing of animals and maybe prevent those folks from dumping any more animals, especially if it was a decent amount of money.

Well I am in the military and I was supposed to be moving off base and I have a friend holding my puppy for me. I was not able to move out and my friend is no longer able to keep the 10 week old puppy for me and im not allowed to keep the puppy in the barracks. I have been looking high and low for a place that adopts or someone to take her for me. I am willing to pay a 60 dollar fee to have her taken in. So if anyone can give me the website or the number to a place where I can take her or if anyone wants to adopt her please let me know. I found her and I couldn't watch her roam the street with no food so I picked her up.

Try Mia at animalswithoulimits.com, She may be able to help.