Volunteer to founder

PHOTO: Sam Camarras’ Heart for Paws advocates for foster animals in humane ways.

By Jackson Chelius 

BlueDevilHUB.com Staff––

After seeing poorly run animal shelters firsthand, Sam Camarra set out to start her non-profit organization, Hearts for Paws, to find great homes for as many dogs as possible.

The organization’s goal for its first year was to rescue and find homes for 10 dogs. That goal ended up being passed, with the number of rescued dogs reaching 250. Now it currently averages 350-400 rescued dogs per year, with an average of 50 dogs in the program at any given time. 

After graduating from USC, Camarra began to volunteer at foster shelters for dogs. This experience was eye-opening. as she “saw how many good dogs were being euthanized,” Camarra said.

She stopped volunteering and started her own non-profit, Hearts for Paws, in 2016. At first, she kept the dogs in an outside kennel-based system on the farm that she grew up on. This wouldn’t work long term though. “It felt like we were taking the dogs out of the foster shelter system and putting them in new cages,” Camarra said.

Hearts for Paws quickly transformed into a volunteer network where the dogs temporarily live with a volunteer in a home environment while waiting to be fostered. This provided a better experience for the dogs than keeping them in a shelter or in cages. 

A lot of the Volunteers for Hearts for Paws come from UC Davis. “It gives students a chance to see what it’s like to take care of a pet for a temporary period and gives the dogs a better home while they wait to be fostered,” Camarra said. 

A struggle that a lot of the volunteers deal with is “compassion fatigue,” a term that describes the physical, emotional, and psychological impacts of helping others. “You help one dog and then you turn around and there’s 100 more,” Camarra said. 

One way the volunteers combat this feeling is to not get burned out and take breaks when needed. “You should also focus on the dogs you are helping,” Camarra said. “It’s better to have helped one dog, than none.” 

“Sam has a heart of gold and will never hesitate to go the extra mile if it means an animal is helped,” said Hearts for Paws volunteer Luna Anona. Anona joined the non-profit at the beginning of the pandemic. “She sees the big picture.”