For most people, animal rescue is a case of rushing to the aid of an endangered or distressed animal. That is often the case. Frontline rescue staff are on call 24/7/365. These people are often the only public face of a rescue organisation as they are the ones the public see. But, I wonder, do the public ever consider what happens once the animal has been picked up. It doesn’t just disappear or go away. The real work of rescue begins once an animal is picked up. There are the problems of veterinary care. There is the question of a holding area. There are fosterers or permanent homes to be considered. Somebody, somewhere, has to organise all these things and also fund the aftercare. Tonight I would like to pay a personal tribute to our ‘shadow’ person, Emilie Peneau, who is solely responsible for the smooth operation that supports the daily running of the ACS.
Emilie is the sole fundraiser and Public Relations Officer of the ACS. She was recruited into the Animal Care Society at a very traumatic time in that organisation’s history following the death of Ann Fitzgerald. I think it’s fair to say that Emilie breathed life into a moribund organisation, gave it a new lease of life, and put in place a coherent and far reaching strategic plan that was designed to move the ACS onto the next stage of its development. Animal rescue is a hugely complicated edifice that requires diverse talents in order to operate to its maximum potential. Emilie is the person at the centre of the storm. It falls upon her to organise the raising of finance from the public through a variety of public activities. Emilie has to plan the event, gather together a diverse group of people, motivate them, collect the money, and then, account for the money raised, in order to maintain a policy of openness and transparency that is incumbent upon all charities. Publicly raised finance has to be treated with the strictest professionalism and accounted for at all times. In the time I have known Emilie, and I speak as someone who has worked professionally within the charity world for 15 years, I have never met someone who has brought such administration skills, coupled with passion and compassion, to her role within the ACS. What makes this achievement so much more remarkable is the fact that this is Emilie’s first venture into running an organisation like the ACS.
Beside the multitude of tasks that befall her in her twin roles of Fundraiser and PR Person, Emilie maintains a constant dedication to the task of TNR and is often out on her own, late into the night, rescuing feral cats and kittens. Emilie has introduced a new concept to the task of TNR by involving local communities and getting people involved in helping the work of TNR by paying for the neutering of cats, looking after the cats once rereleased, and finding homes for kittens. One of Emily’s major successes has been, of course, Ballycotton, where, with the support of the good people of Ballycotton, she has just about TNRed every feral cat in the town. Quite often this has meant that Emilie has finished a day’s work with the ACS, and then, returned to Ballycotton to trap another feral
This untrammelled dedication is based upon Emilie’s personal beliefs and values and perhaps shaped, if not a little, by the writings of Margaret Atwood, the Canadian writer and intellectual, famed for her passion for all creatures and their environment. It is so refreshing, and so very rare, to discover a person who has both the belief system and the courage to follow that belief through hard work. Emilie has become the ‘Brigitte Bardot’ of Ireland. A compassionate individual, driven by her values, to alleviate the suffering endured by countless animals in this country.
That the ACS is still able to operate to the level it does is due to the long hours, and hard, hard, work, of Emilie, and the passion she brings to her role. At Christmas, when fundraising activities were at their peak, Emilie came home every night following a days work, to a house full of kittens she had rescued and was now caring for. They had to be fed, kitty litters had to changed, and their medical requirements seen after. Never once did Emilie’s enthusiasm or good nature flag under this enormous strain. Emilie always maintained a cheerful demeanour in the face of the most arduous demands upon her time and energy. No situation was deemed so bad that a workable solution could not be found. If I carry one memory of Emilie, it is of a beaming face, looking out through the windscreen of a tiny car, surrounded by cages, traps, cats, and all the fundraising paraphenalia of the ACS, as she headed off on another mission.
Their Lives. Her Passion.
