Dear supporters and friends,
It’s been a year since the vulture fund came to warn us that they were the new owners of the place we rent and threatened us with taking legal action if we failed to leave.
As I explained in a previous newsletter, from that moment on, our life was turned upside down and we started living the worst nightmare ever. Our physical and mental health have deteriorated alarmingly since last year.
I have no words to describe it, but I guess there is no need to give further details. Anyone can imagine what is like to live knowing that you and your loved ones could end up homeless any minute and the impact it’d have on their lives.
After a year of struggle, dreading the final outcome of the legal actions that the vulture fund has taken against us, we are now at the final stage of the trial.
In about 3 or 4 months, a judge will decide whether we are eligible for social-rental mediation as provided by law for disadvantaged /vulnerable family units or will deny our petition and rule in favor of the vulture fund to proceed with eviction.
This final ruling will determine our fate; someone will decide whether we get to live, or we are left to die out on the streets. Because if we lose our place, that’s it! We’ll have nowhere to go and once homeless we’ll never have access to housing again.
According to our lawyer, in these cases it’s hard to predict what the judge will decide. Even though we are allegedly protected by law and there have been many cases in which it was ruled in favor of the tenants, there have also been many other cases in which the judges have ruled in favor of the vulture fund.
To continue paying for legal assistance until the end of the trial and surviving for a few more months until the final sentence is ruled, we need to raise at least US$ 5000 (=4500€).
Without these funds we are doomed. We won’t be able to continue fighting and we’ll have to surrender, and face forced eviction.
So, we have no choice but to reach out for help, however, believe me when I say that this is the last thing we’d want to do. Jackie and I are exhausted and feel humiliated every time we must do this in order to survive. We so wish we had our own financial means, so we didn’t have to bother anyone, but sadly we don’t.
Despite our lack of funds, we can’t just sit around and passively accept our fate without putting up a fight until the end, especially considering there’s still a chance we can win.
We owe it to these defenseless animals who were abandoned to their fate and whom we took off the streets to give them a second chance at life. Most of them are now seniors, many are chronically ill and depend on us.
I can assure you that if we didn’t have so many innocent lives to protect and care for, Jackie and I would stop fighting right away and would never ask anyone for anything, anymore. If we could, we’d leave it all to chance and go wherever life may take us, but we can’t.
We’re racing against the clock as our court case continues; next hearing is on July 18, when our lawyer must submit the updated documentation regarding our current social/financial situation. In the following months, the judge is expected to make a final decision.
So, if you find it in your heart to help us get through this final stage by donating, we’ll be truly grateful.
Paul
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Highlights
See all activity16About Us
At the end of 2012, when a wave of evictions took place due to the housing market crash caused by the subprime mortgage crisis that occurred between 2007-2010, the streets were flooded with abandoned house cats trying to fend for themselves; that’s exactly when the story of Change One Life Cat Sanctuary began.
Witnessing everyday homeless cats being ran over, neglected, abused and ignored as they were crying out for help and dying on the streets, moved us (me and my wife) to leave our conventional living to start rescuing all the cats that we could get off the streets to nurse them back to health and protect them.
At the same time, we started caring for those we couldn’t rescue by providing food and fresh water daily.
"That’s how our story began and since then it’s been ten years of trying to cope with endless logistical difficulties, financial problems and personal struggle."
Sanctuary co-founders Jackie and Paul with first rescue Felix, back in December 2012 when they still led an ordinary life.
We, the co-founders and caregivers of the Sanctuary, are a couple of immigrants in our late 50’s who are currently unemployed and live rented.
It’s always been just the two of us so in order to carry on we’ve had to make endless sacrifices, forget about having a regular job or a steady income and in doing so we turned our personal lives upside down...
Sanctuary co-founders Jackie and Paul with their rescues Oliver, Kitty and Blackberry Melody, now in 2023.
"We gave up everything to give this cause all our time, knowledge, love and compassion."
We started our mission by selling the very few things we owned to kickstart our cat rescue project and cover the initial expenses of our small sanctuary.
Afterwards and until this day, we have been able to carry on thanks to our sponsoring program, the private donations we receive from our supporters, and in addition, to an irregular income my wife and I get every now and then from some of the work we do online, which also helps cover part of our cat sanctuary expenses.
In 2015, with the help of private donations they could leave behind the old playground Paul had made out of cardboard boxes and were able to buy cat furniture and supplies.
"Over the last decade, we’ve been through so much it’d be impossible to list here all the sacrifices made and the challenges we had to face to stay alive and protect the lives of our rescues."
So, if you wish to learn a bit more about us, we invite you to read our first newsletter to find a detailed summary of our journey since the early beginnings, or CLICK HERE to visit Our Website
