Thanks to the efforts of Tamira Thayne, Michael Vick’s Bad Newz Kennels will now be turned into something good.
Thayne’s organization, Dogs Deserve Better (DDB), which was founded for the sole purpose of raising awareness of, rescuing and helping to change laws for chained and penned dogs across the country, received the good news on Friday that they were approved for a bank loan to cover the remaining two thirds of the purchase price of Vick’s former property which will now be known as Good Newz Rehab Center.
The idea of turning Vick’s property into a canine rehab center came at an organizational meeting. One of DDB’s Virginia reps, Shannon Allen mentioned that the Vick property was still for sale and “…wouldn’t it be awesome if we could take it over?” Thayne discussed the idea with her board members and visited the site. “It all fell into place from there,” said Thayne.
When asked if she found the property haunting, Thayne said no, and added “I felt when I was there that the dogs who lost their lives and suffered there welcomed us and were grateful to us for both preserving their memories, continuing the fight against dog abuse, and bringing happiness to a place of such sadness.”
DDB’s plans for the property is to build a state-of-the-art dog facility where formerly abused dogs will be housed, trained, and eventually get adopted. Their first year goal will be to adopt out 500 dogs a year. Their long-range goal will be to move at least 1,000 dogs a year.
And while the rehab center will in some ways be similar to a regular animal shelter, the concept is actually much larger as the dogs living there will have to be socialized after spending their whole lives being chained or penned up.
Thayne explains: “For us, having a standard shelter is not the answer, because we have to be teaching these dogs how to live within the home and family. So we want to design a center where they will be trained in a house setting every day, working one on one or in small groups with a human to assess and deal with issues and teach housetraining and people skills. We’re excited to work with ideas to make this center the absolute best it can be for meeting the needs of the dogs and getting them ready to live inside the home with new, loving families.”
DDB also plans on making a memorial to the Vick dogs who fought, suffered and died on the site.
As for Vick, Thayne said she hasn’t heard of any reaction by him or his camp. “We know he knows about it, he was asked in an interview about it and said he thought it was a good idea. Nothing more.”
Want to donate to Dogs Deserve Better? You can do it here!
This is just wonderful. Bless you all for making something so good out of something so tragic. I hope that neighbours will now get on board as I believe, initially, there was some resistance.
Vick’s, not Vicks’s. Please fix the headline. Otherwise, good story.
I love the idea, and God knows we need space such as this to accomplish this admirable endeavor, but dogs’ noses are too good to not smell out the cruelty that has gone on here, the buriels that have taken place, and where, and react accordingly. There must be some other way or purpose to turn this property into something that will bring good from the unbelievable cruelty that occurred here. We may not smell it, but believe me, dogs do!
Can I have a job please.. I can be their house trainer and smooch on them allllll day.