Appeal launched to help build assistance dog centre

A four-fold increase in demand for assistance dogs over the past year has sparked an urgent national fundraising appeal to help build a new training facility in Cork.

Cork charity, Dogs for the Disabled, is aiming to raise €500,000 to complete its new state-of-the-art National Training Centre.

For more than 18 years, the Togher-based charity has bred, trained, and placed assistance dogs with children and adults living with disabilities across Ireland.

However, the small size of the charity’s current rented property means it currently cannot expand its services, recruit new staff, or train enough assistance dogs to meet the soaring demands.

After years of careful saving, Dogs for the Disabled finally secured its dream property on 11 acres on the outskirts of Cork city, but the property needs complete renovation and development before the charity can operate at the site.

With this new facility, Dogs for the Disabled want to provide a service that is close to Cork city for training purposes and easy for clients to find, while offering enough space for children to have the privacy to learn to walk with their new assistance dogs in private.

The charity also wished to create its forever home – a space for it to grow and continue to expand its services as demand continued to increase.

A spokesperson for the Dogs for the Disabled said: “The demand for our assistance dogs has never been greater, and we cannot meet this need without urgent public support.

“We are calling on businesses, communities, and individuals across Ireland to come together and help us reach our €500,000 fundraising target.

“Every donation, big or small, will bring us one step closer to meeting the demand for our services and providing more life-changing assistance dogs to those who need them most,” they added.

Dogs for the Disabled receives no annual government funding, while each of its life-changing assistance dogs costs €15,000 to produce.

The charity has a very strict policy that no money exchanges hands for its dogs. This ensures the charity retains legal ownership of each dog throughout their lifetime to guarantee their welfare and care and to ensure that beneficiaries receive their dog based on need and not their ability to pay.

The spokesperson said: “Help Dogs for the Disabled to make a bigger difference to children and adults living with physical disabilities around Ireland.

“With the public’s support, we can build a future where no one with a physical disability in Ireland has to wait the current 3-5 years for a life-changing assistance dog.”