Welcome to our fundraising page!
Our names are Kate and Doug and we run Community Dog Welfare Kopan (now Community Dog Welfare Centre)- a non-profit. Our long term mission is developing community awareness and responsibility for dog welfare in Nepal.
Our daily mission is providing for sick, injured, aged and abandoned dogs in our rescue centre.
We have evolved from caring for occasional dogs we noticed struggling on the streets of Kathmandu, to a busy and over-crowded shelter of over 150 dogs. Many of these are young with high attention demands, many are old and need specialised geriatric care, and many are special needs. Our five members of Nepali staff work along-side us day-in-day-out to do our best for these dogs.
2024 Update
In the past two years, we’ve fenced in a majority of the property including four large areas for the dogs to run and play. We have built a ‘New Arrivals’ area from scratch where incoming dogs are treated. Plus, we constructed an area for the older dogs and wheelchair dogs to give them a calmer space separate from the more active dogs. Our most recent project was to build an on-site clinic to do basic treatments for our dogs.
This property has come a long way from being an open space with no infrastructure, apart from some chicken sheds, to a happy home for over 150 dogs. But, we still have a few more buildings to add. At the moment, we have nowhere to work. Taking care of 150 dogs takes planning and as a nonprofit, there’s a lot of paperwork and work which often goes unseen. We also need an isolation unit to keep our dogs safe from contagious diseases that incoming dogs may be carrying. And, we are hoping to build an additional pen for adopted dogs that are awaiting their flights to their forever homes.
When we first established this fundraiser, we had a goal of $7,000 AUD and we were able to raise $6,000 AUD to get us started. Through two additional fundraisers, we were given $1,350 and $1,485 to put towards the shelter, as well as a private donation of $3,895 AUD to build an area for the wheelchair dogs. That brought us to a total of $12,730 AUD. However, this money has been used on the initial phases of the construction. We have actually spent $14,200 AUD total in building the new centre.
Admin Building
We are looking to raise $6,000 AUD to build a Welcome Centre/Admin Building. We’d like this building to have the following…
- An office with internet which can be used by our founders and manager to do paperwork, budgets, and work on long-term and short-term goals for the dog centre.
- A meeting room which can be used by our board members to hold meeting, and it can also be used as an educational centre. At our previous location, we would have schools come and visit to learn about street dogs and animal welfare.
- We would like to include two rooms which can be used by long term volunteers as lodging. As our location is further from the city, we have not had as many visitors as we used to, and we’d like to encourage more people to volunteer with the dogs.
- Last but not least, the space would have a small kitchen and a bathroom.
At the moment, our “admin area” is a table located under some bamboo trees. There are no walls, no ceiling, no internet, and nowhere to store important papers. We meet visitors here, have board meetings here, and plan for the entire centre at this table. Monsoon season is around the corner and without a place to hold meetings or conduct business, we will have a difficult time.
Isolation Unit
We are looking to raise $3,000 AUD to build an Isolation Unit for incoming dogs who should be quarantined before entering the main centre. This unit will have the following…
- Three or four separate small buildings to keep incoming dogs isolated until we can confirm that they are not contagious. There’s been an outbreak of distemper in Kathmandu. Sadly, it’s almost impossible to treat, and it’s highly contagious. Most dogs don’t survive. With new dogs constantly moving in and out of the center for treatment, it puts out residential dogs at risk. Having an isolation unit will allow us to keep the dogs in a quarantine until we are sure they aren’t contagious. This unit can also be used to treat Parvo virus and TVT (a contagious cancer that is also an STD).
- A handwash station for our staff to get cleaned up before working with other dogs in the centre.
- A separate fenced in space for each building so that the dogs can stretch their legs and get some exercise without having contact with the other dogs.
New Area for Adopted Dogs
We are looking to raise $1,500 AUD to build an Adopted Dog Area for dogs waiting to fly to their forever families. This area will contain the following…
- A separate fenced in area for dogs that are waiting to fly to their forever family. The process of flying a dog to another country can take 6 months to a year! During this time, it’s important to make sure the dogs don’t get any contagious diseases or get into any fights with the other dogs. If something were to happen to them before their flight, it could ruin their chance of being able to fly out.
- The area will also feature a covered enclosure to protect the dogs from rain and provide shade from the sun.
- This area can also act as a socializing area for the shy dogs who need more human interaction so that they have a better chance of being adopted or sponsored. These dogs often get overlooked or go unnoticed because the more confident dogs tend to get all the attention.
Breakdown of what was spent so far…
- Initial setup of boundary fence/wall and sub division of dogs into four main areas on the largest piece of land. This included building a kitchen, small storage room and bathroom. Payment for the chicken sheds was also made. This stage was completed in February 2023 and cost $7,270 AUD.
- The second stage included an arrivals area for incoming dogs with separate kennels set up and a larger surrounding pen for them to hang out in during the day. We also built a small temporary shelter for holding meetings. The area was completed in July 2024 and cost $1,100 AUD.
- Stage three was our wheelchair and elderly dog area. This area has pavers to make it easy for the wheel chair dogs to get around. It also has an enclosed shelter with plexiglass to allow the warm sun to come in. The dogs in this area are typically on the older side and can enjoy time away from the more active dogs. This area was completed in January 2024 and cost $4,000 AUD. The money was generously donated by Julie.
- Our most recent addition was the clinic which is located next to the arrivals area where we had our temporary meeting room. This was complete in April 2024 and cost $1,500 AUD. This area was sponsored by Scarlett and Gill who both ran 5k a day for 2 months to fundraise for the shelter.
We’ve been able to upcycle a lot of used items in our construction by buying pavers and bricks that were being removed from sidewalks and houses. This has allowed us to keep the costs of building the centre down, but we have run out of money to finish building.
This fundraiser will help us move toward completing our vision for the dog center. Every donation counts and we appreciate your support.
Original Fundraising Message from 2022/2023
To our distress, the area our shelter has been located for the last 12 years has become increasing over-populated and urbanised. The surrounding fields we used to love watching our recovered dogs play in are now full of concrete houses and private farm land. This has lead to growing conflicts with the local community - not everyone is a dog lover and they have been making this very clear. It has reached a level where we have no other choice but to move the shelter and relocate, to somewhere our dogs will be happy and undisturbed. Here we hope to continue our missions.
We are starting this fundraiser due to our urgent need of funding to build a fence around the land we have rented - and move as soon as possible. The fence will be two layers of concrete blocks, under corrugated iron or mesh netting, supported by steel poles. We will use second hand material wherever possible for environmental impact and to reduce costs.
Donations of any size are greatly appreciated and will go towards helping the work we do.
Thank you.
Kate and Doug
Pictures of our current shelter:
Where we are moving:
We'd like to thank all of our generous donors. If there are any extra funds, they will be transferred over to our Medical Fund which goes toward the medical treatments of street dogs and community dogs in Gokarneshwor.