Hi, and welcome to the Animal Welfare Junction. This is your host, Dr. G, and our music is written and produced by Mike Sullivan. Today's guest is Julia Grosz, executive director of Cat Hustler. Welcome to the Junction.

Hi, thanks for having me.

Let's start with letting our audience know who you are and what led you to where you are today.

My name is Julia Grosz, and I, uh, I'm, I'm a cat lady, man. I'm a cat lady, uh, and in true cat lady and rescuer fashion, I took my hyper independence into doing my own thing, uh, and that, uh, originally was writing bios for shelter cats. So Cat Hustler started, uh, when I was a shelter volunteer, uh, in Virginia. And, uh, I noticed that these animals were not getting the social media attention that they deserve. This was back in 2016, 17, before, um, in the great before, in the world, before things have changed a lot since then. And, uh, shelter cat promotion online is, uh, It's exploded, it's blossomed, and I'm not needed there anymore, but where I realized there was a void to be filled was programming for cat rescuers. This community is so scattered, and they don't talk, they don't meet up to do anything, and a big part of getting anything done in any field is networking, and cat ladies, oh we like, we like cats more than people, so we don't make time to build relationships. And those relationships are the things that get the job done. So I started running networking parties and symposiums and all kinds of stuff that eventually, uh, developed into the Acatemy, which is a national cat rescue conference where hundreds of cat rescuers from across the country get together, make some memories. Uh, don't ask each other for anything and just build their lifesaving network and develop their skills to do the best they can with what they've got.

You bring up a great point, um, about how people need to network, right? Because there are, there are so many different ways of doing things and some people have it easier than others and it's because of their experience and education and being able to have a lot of people together. Talking about these things. And yes, I'm saying talking, not yelling at each other and bitching at each other about doing it right or wrong. But talking to each other about how things can work can, in the grand scheme of things, help everyone. So what, what really, so what, let's talk about this. What is the Acatemy?

The Acatemy is a bunch of cat ladies getting together, uh, completely destroying their social batteries for the year. Running around either a hotel or a convention center in cat ears, and just being their biggest, loudest, most authentic selves among people who get them. We have, this year I think we have 37 sessions. Because we've been incorporated the United States Alliance conference as well. We have that live streaming in one of the rooms because the schedule is perfectly overlapped. And that just seemed like too, uh, good of an opportunity to not collaborate on. Uh, but we offer sessions on professional development, like how to work with the public. We have a hostage negotiator coming in to help cat rescuers deal with angry colony caretakers, that kind of stuff. Uh, we have people talking about fundraising because while cat rescuers and the people in charge of these organizations have huge hearts, they The business sense doesn't always come with that. So we want to help equip people to do better, uh, and make smarter moves for their organizations, which are in essence a business. We have someone doing a TikTok 101 talk. So that we can get all these, uh, not technophobes, but people who are generationally, generationally not in touch with the technology. We can demystify things and help get their cats onto different platforms and reach other audiences. Uh, so it's about professional development. It's about personal development. We have a local grief counselor who's joining us because we've We've been through a lot, like this line of work is heartbreaking and heavy and really intense. Uh, on top of that, the past four years, if anybody says they're okay, I don't trust them. Uh, and a lot of our attendees are of a certain demographic and they're starting to have to take care of their parents and there's grief and stuff involved with that. And. The people who come to the Acatemy are making time for themselves and their cause. And I want to be able to give them an opportunity to take care of their whole selves. Uh, and that involves, I gave, I had this room designated as my screaming room. This grief counselor popped up and she's like, Hey, I'm like, Oh yeah, no, take that room. It's fine. So we're doing on demand grief counseling appointments because I love the cat rescuers and they're my people and I want them to be able to come out of this weekend. feeling loved and like their work matters and that they matter.

And this is happening, uh, what is it, October 12th and 13th in Cleveland, Ohio at the IX Expo Center. So anybody listening, if this is before October 12th and 13th, uh, 2024, please plan on being there. Because it's going to be, it's going to be great. Now, as we, as we invite people, who is, who is your target audience? Who are the people that attended, you know, these conferences? Are we talking about like average lay people? Is this veterinarians? Is this people in shelter? Like who, who makes up the audience for this?

Historically, we've been a lot of, uh, board members for smaller nonprofits. We've got shelter workers, we've got shelter administrators. Um, there are plenty of conferences for shelter, uh, and animal control folks, and a lot of veterinary conferences out there, but nothing until the Acatemy has served exclusively cat rescuers. Our programming is designed for boots on the ground folks, uh, freelancers, things that the average person can take away from sessions and implement, whether they're, uh, a standalone foster, or if they're with an organization, there's something for everyone. So this year we have, uh, we're incorporating Kitten College. Uh, National Kitten College, which is a program that started in Arlington, Arlington, Virginia. And they will be offering CE credits. They work with veterinary colleges, uh, with neonatal kitten care. So you can get CE credits, even, uh, as a vet tech, anything like that. For vets, there is Uh, a lot of content in the United Spay Alliance, uh, conference that, uh, wet lab stuff, a bunch of things I don't understand because I'm a geologist by day, this is not my language, but it seems cool. It seems relevant and cool. Uh, so we'll have that streaming all weekend as, uh, it's included in your Acatemy registration. So you've got three conferences in one.

And what is, what is the cost to attend?

We've got one day registrations for 55 or 45. A weekend is 85. Uh, and for my alums, the people who have been to the past couple of conferences, I offer significant discounts because we're all in it to win it. Uh, the organizations that are bringing three or more people get 25 percent off. And if you do five or more people on one code, I will give you a free registration to share with a donor or a star volunteer or whomever you'd like.

So how can our listeners sign up? Like, how can they register, uh, online ahead of time, or can they register on site?

Strongly prefer registering in advance, that way we can print your conference badge ahead of time and you can pick up at our Friday night mixer because networking is everything. You can register at theAcatemy. org

And that is the acat C A T A C A T O M E dot org. I don't want people just typing Academy. Uh, so the Acatemy dot org. Check it, check it out. I mean, I, I think that the lineup of speakers that you have is amazing. Uh, and I, you know, some of these people are people that I have done conferences with in the past. So I really respect the, their knowledge and what they bring about with cats. I'm gonna give a shout out to some of my faves. Uh, Tabitha Kucera, who is amazing at behavior. We're BFFs. Um, and then we have Monica Tarrant with GiveEm10, and, you know, their, their slogan with it's hip to be snipped and, and the cat. I mean, I love the cat. Every time I see the cat, I want to photo up with the cat. So I hope, I'm hoping the cat is there. Um, and then Stacey LeBaron, you know, with Community Cats Podcast. Like she has so much information and she's done so much. So this is an amazing lineup of people that you have here. What can you tell us about some of the other, some of the other individuals that, or some of the other presenters that you have coming in?

Well, we have Arden Moore, who is just one of the warmest and most wonderful people you've ever met. She is doing a cat first aid and CPR class on Sunday morning. It's a separate registration within the Acatemy since she's a paid instructor. But these certifications, she'll print you out a certification and like let you bandage her, uh, her safety cat, who'll be around with her. She's amazing. We've got Missy Pruitt, uh, out of Arizona, who's going to be talking about, uh, How to reach gen alpha kids and recruit the next generation of cat rescuers and cat advocates, because, uh, everybody knows everybody who's paying even a little bit of attention knows that cat rescuers, the backbone of this niche group, we're aging out of it and we need to be able to pass the torch. So that's going to be a very important one. You are doing 10 things, uh, your low cost spay and neuter vet wants you to And I think that is just the coolest. I think that's amazing because I have seen, I think everybody has seen, especially your listeners, these TNR groups burn the bridge and piss on the ashes at these high intensity, high volume clinics. And that is, it doesn't have to be like that. I'm looking forward to hearing what you have to say about making that not

It's going to be welcome to my rant. This is my, my little rant on how to not piss me off because yeah, they need to hear it because as veterinarians, we go into this profession to help animals and then we get people that get in our face and say, you don't care. And that's the last, last thing that you can say to somebody to make them help you. It makes them not want to help you. So I'm hoping that I can, you know, not everybody's going to agree with what I say and that's okay. That's okay. But, it's, it's just how to approach veterinarians so that you can help the animals that you're helping. You can't do it alone. So, here, here are some tips to, to stay in it.

And they only hear these things when it's too late. So I think you're going to have a full room of people who want to hear how to not fuck this up.

Yeah, right? Yeah.

I actually ran a contest within one of the regional TNR groups out here in Virginia. What should this talk be called? If there were no filter, what would it be called? I think one of them was, uh, I'm not coming back if Brenda's here. Don't laugh. I don't know who Brenda is, but there's always one. Just ruins it for everybody.

So I see that you have a topic of neurodivergence as an asset in rescue, and I've been hearing more about that. So what's, what's that about? I see that the, that the talk is called fostering with a spicy brain. I love that. What, what, what does that mean?

This is something that has come up for a lot of people in, sorry, women specifically, in cat rescue over the past few years as the changes to the DSM criteria have changed, as we've, a lot of us have learned, Oh! I'm neurodivergent. Like all these things that made my life difficult before, um, turns out those are checkboxes for ADHD and autism and all these things that girls weren't tested for in the past because the criteria was based on boys. Uh, back in my day it was called Stop It. And a lot of people are learning that there's nothing really wrong with them. They're just trying to run Windows on a Mac system. So a talk like this helps people understand how to relate to the world around them, how to put in systems that work for you and the way that your brain works. There's nothing wrong with you. You're just trying to, you're just trying to run on a different operating system. And there are practices that you can put into place and perspectives that you can change to make better decisions. Life and the whole world's a lot easier.

And who's doing the, who, who did you pick to give this presentation?

Uh, Patty Hinko is, I believe she's a middle school teacher, and she deals with these feral ass kids. And she has a very, very good grip on this stuff, and she herself is of the spicy persuasion, and we, we like learning things from people who intimately understand them. We also have Samantha Stevens from the Blind Cat Sanctuary, who's going to be talking about how to use live streams on social media to connect with your donors and community. I've been following Blind Cat Sanctuary for It feels like a decade. They do scheduled live streams of their facilities. They kind of demystify what's involved with cat sanctuaries, um, which is a wonderful thing because I have terrible experiences with them. A lot of cat rescuers have, and they're realizing that sanctuary is often, too often, a euphemism for a hoarding situation. But they are doing a talk on transparency and relating to donors. They do, I believe they do two or three live streams a day touring their facility and introducing people to the cats. And it involves a level of comfort with the technology and live speaking and, uh, transparency that I think a lot of cat rescuers could benefit from, even if they're just introducing their own fosters, if they're working in shelters and want to get the word out to the public. I think it's going to be a very, very valuable session for people.

And I see something that I can personally benefit from is you have about navigating cat introductions with confidence, like multi-cat household success. I may need to sit in on that one because my cats hate each other. Um, and I, and I did, and I followed all the steps, and I did everything right, and I guess they haven't killed each other, so that's good. But, but it is, it is something really important, like people don't understand that, that cats are, how cats are and how to introduce another cat and when you bring a new cat or anything else into the home or you move their litter box one inch to the right their whole life changes right like they they just like stress out over nothing and and they start doing stupid stuff and then we think that they're just getting back at us and realistically we are messing with them. So I think that it is great having something about how to safely introduce cats, how to do it properly so that you don't, you don't put yourself behind the 8-ball, right?

Laura is wonderful. Laura usually works with the public. She is a, uh, she does private consultation out here in Baltimore. And. She submitted this talk. It was off of a, you know, the speakers will give you a menu of here are my pre made talks and the Acatemy doesn't roll like that. We have a very specific audience and it's easy to speak down to this audience because we're, we're seasoned. We know what we're doing. We've been around for a bit. And as, as a vet, I'm sure you have plenty of experiences with rescuers knowing everything.

You know, a lot of, a lot of rescuers and people that do TNR and stuff are these. older people that have been doing it for years and years and years. And I'm using older in the nicest form of the word. I don't want people like bashing me like I'm older. So, but you have individuals that have been doing this for 20, 30 years, and, and they have experience, but they don't know everything, but they think they know everything. And you have a lot of veterinarians and newer people trying to start things. And there's a lot of you're doing it wrong, and you don't know what you're doing. And And trying to push people away when we need to, you know, bring them in.

Exactly. Uh, so when my speakers approach me with a, a proposal, sometimes I'll ask them to tune it. Like assume that these people already know the 101 stuff, maybe even 201. So all the Acatemy content is masterclass. Laura did an amazing job in tuning her menu presentation to people like you and I, who we've tried everything. We know these things. It's like. Okay, what next? Give us master class content. And she has done an amazing job of doing that. She is bringing her, not Padawan, what's the word I'm looking for? Uh, protege? Okay. She's bringing her protege, Mary Stevens, who has been a vet tech for 18 years, and she is going to teach us how to do stress, sorry, low stress, Not stress free, can't stop that. The stress free medication for, I'm gonna need you to help me with the, the terminology here, uh, eyes, ears, oral, um, topical, uh, just how to, just, uh, give medication in various formats so that people will pill their cats. And also how to reduce the stress of TNR clinics on the cats.

That, that is super important because one of the things, and I don't want to give up what I'm talking about in the presentation, because I want people to come in and listen to it, but there are people that set their cats up for failure. And yeah, it's only a day, but it's like the most horrible day of their life when it's not done right. Like it doesn't have to be. So there are things that we can do to make, to make cats lives easier. And it makes the cats less stressed, and then it makes the veterinary team less stressed.

So there's a, she's going to be covering a lot of in suite stuff to help reduce the stress of those visits, as well as stuff at home so that the, the fosters who are getting these cats adopted can help the adopters. Medicaid more easily at home. I saw a video in the presentation about uh, administering injections, which is super helpful. Uh, because I, I had a lot of anxiety about that when I first, when I did administering subcute fluids and all that. Uh, and I'm hoping that it'll help maybe diabetic cats get adopted. If we demystify it a little bit.

And I see for the, for the bigger or more organized groups, you have Danielle Bays from the HSUS talking about how to basically figure out if your efforts are making a difference. And I think that that's so important because when you go to a legislator or even to city council and you want to propose a TNR program, you can't just show up, you know, Looking like a cat lady. I'm sorry, cat ladies. Tone it down a little bit, uh, but you got to know how to show up, how to speak to these people. And then you have to have numbers. You can't just say, well, it just is. So I think that that, that is a really interesting topic that you're bringing in.

This Danielle is uniquely qualified to do this, and it is such a privilege to have her agree. Um, back, I think it was 2020 when they were doing the DC cat count. Around here was a huge, huge deal, uh, because as you know, getting the metrics for these things is, um, brutal, and no one really knows how to go about doing it, and HSUS, it takes an organization like HSUS putting money and trained personnel behind it to make it happen, and I'm hoping that the model they've created can transfer to smaller communities. She's going to be sharing information about data collection. Uh, how to present it, a little bit of statistics, but I think it's critical that TNR groups, local TNR groups understand these things, because without the numbers, you're just sitting there screaming at the cat hunters in town hall meetings.

Yeah. Oh, and I can't, I can't. even with myself. I forgot to give a shout out to Dr. Lee Schrader because she is the co rep with me for Humane Society Veterinary Alliance. So sorry, Dr. Schrader, if you're listening to this, I love you. You're awesome. And, uh, and yeah, big shout out. She's going to be talking about donor engagement, recognition and retention and animal rescue, which is so important. Like we can't do what we do without help, without funds, without assistance, and how we keep these people happy, right?

Dr. Schrader, I was lucky enough to get her on Zoom for an hour, and she is a gift. Dr. Schrader is just a spectacular, warm, Delightful person. And, uh, she has such great insights on how to make donors feel special and wanted, and she understands the boundaries of what you can and can't talk about in written communications when you're asking for help, it's going to be a really, really good session.

Yes, she is an amazing human being. Um, and she's been doing this for so long and people don't realize she, she's a diplomat of the college of internal medicine, veterinary college of internal medicine. Like she is not. Like your, your run of the mill veterinarian, this is an internist and she knows so much and she has so much experience and she's putting all of this time and effort into running, like as executive director of the Fayette County Humane Society. And it, yeah, she, she's an amazing person. So definitely, I recommend that people come to, to see what she has to talk about.

Oh, we also have, uh, Von Young, who is a longtime friend from here in Virginia. She'll be doing a session on how to run a kitten cafe pop up. So all the legalities involved, all the health code stuff. For people who want to, I've always thought about opening a cat cafe. It's kind of a dip your toes in the water for fun and maybe profit. It'll be a cool one. Von is, uh, an exceptionally creative and wonderful person. I'm very excited for the Iowans to meet her.

And, and I guess finally, like, uh, who is this cowboy that's teaching people about trapping cats?

Uh, Bob, the cowboy cat wrangler Lynch. And. Uh, Angelo, the Matt Catter, what's his last name? Rufo. I just call him Angelo. Uh, these two are out of Philly. They're gonna be upstairs at the CFA show most of the time, but, um, they presented at my 2020 conference. They were wonderful. They did a TNR 101, uh, with Tomahawk LiveTrap. They showed people hands on how to, uh, to work traps and took the intimidation and mystery out of it. So this time they're going to be hosting a roundtable where trappers can come in and share their tips and tricks for different food, do a hands on demo and show like rubber band tricks or whatever it is they do with the traps and just give the trappers an opportunity to learn from each other. This is a lot of knowledge and insight that never gets shared because they're never in the same room.

Yeah, this is again, this is like a really amazing lineup of speakers that you have put together. Um, it's, it's literally everything and anything that you need to do TNR to, to foster cats, to deal with stuff and then to also to take care of yourself because there's a lot of compassion fatigue happening. There are a lot of people leaving rescues. There's a lot of problem with pet overpopulation and euthanasia and everything else. So we need this. We need, we need a place where like minded people get together, um, You know, leave their claws home and just come in to have a good time. And yeah, there are, there are like meetup events, right? Like, uh, the Acatemy After Dark. What's that about?

We've got a mixer on Friday night for the folks who come early, pick up your badge, grab a drink, grab dinner with some new friends. We've got our after party on Saturday night where it's going to be 200 cat ladies. We're going to do kind of like a Halloween thing. So it'll, because we're over 30, we're not dead. It's, you know. You got to make time for that stuff. And the same thing, we have a weekend long egg hunt with prizes worth up to, I think, 300? So that'll be a good time. And on Sunday, we have our wine down dinner and within our conference app, everybody has the ability to start a meetup. So you can find a lunch group, a special interest lunch group. You can organize a breakfast or brunch for yourself before sessions start. You can find lunch buddies. It's all about networking. We've got the tools built in to handle it.

Awesome. And then by By signing up for the Acatemy, as you said, there'll be able to, to watch the United Spay Alliance stuff. And then there's also the cat show happening, right?

There is the, uh, CFA or cat fanciers association show upstairs. They're, they are actually the ones that invited us to join them in Cleveland. They are big on rescue inclusivity and wanted to walk their talk. They bought us swag bags. They bought us lanyards. They've been very good to us. Uh, they will have. a lot of 101 content upstairs. They have their big international show where Uh, they've got folks flying in from all over the world to show their cats. But they've also got a lot of rescue content for the public. It's not it's something like what we do. There's a little bit of overlap with our speakers But they've got stuff like Nudacris, the sphinx cat, is getting married at two o'clock on Saturday. So all gifts that are brought are going to, I'm sorry, I forgot the beneficiary rescue, uh, they've got exhibiting rescues with adoptable animals. They've got, um, a cat daddy panel. They have, they got all kinds of stuff. You can find it on their website, uh, cfa. org slash expo.

So yeah, I mean, this is, this is an awesome weekend. If you're a cat person, just, just stop. Just attend, just do it. Um, and, and again, is the Acatemy A C A T e. M. Y. Acatemy dot org. Um, to sign up to get information. You can go to the animal welfare junction facebook page because we're gonna have the information there as well. The links and everything else. Um, and yeah, this is, this is just amazing. I mean, I guess, I guess I gotta say first, thank you for putting this together. Uh, second, thank you for including me. Um, I know you had no idea who I was and what you were getting into asking me to be part of this. So thank you for, for including me and having me, uh, share information with, with these people that that are working so hard to help cats. And I'm so, so glad that this exists to help them out.

And thank you for lending the Rascal unit. That's going to be parked outside all weekend so the public can check it out. I think that's right. It's a beautiful thing that people are going to see that there are accessible services out there. And there are people who. Care enough to bring the help to them.

Yeah. As long as we don't piss us off. Right. So check out the truck, see what we do, see what we offer, and then learn how to, how to keep us coming. So is there anything that we, that we forgot to mention anything else that you wanted to say?

I'm super proud of all my speakers. I'm proud of what we've built and what we're going to keep building. And I hope that the Ohioans find a lot of use in this.

So yeah, thank you Julia so much for being here. Uh, thank you for, for doing this and for everybody who's listening. I hope to see you there. And as always, thank you for listening and thank you for caring. Thank you for having me.