Animal assistance organization helped relocate hundreds of horses

By: BARBARA HENRY | Friday, October 26, 2007 11:09 PM PDT ∞

Staff Writer

The woman who is perhaps best known in San Diego County for doing television news spots featuring adoptable animals helped to orchestrate the evacuation of hundreds of horses as wildfires raged across the region this week.

But don't try to praise Darlene White, who runs the San Diego Animal Support Foundation. She would much rather credit the many people who offered to transport or house the evacuated animals.

"I'm just an idiot with a phone and computer," White joked as she described how she set up the temporary regional assistance network.

By Friday, her informal network contained 800 to 1,000 names and phone numbers of good Samaritans who had offered help.

The system had helped link hundreds of frantic horse owners with people who could provide temporary housing or trailers to get horses away from the flames, she said.

In addition to serving equestrian needs, the service also assisted dozens of people who needed a place to put dogs and cats. It even helped goat and llama owners. One ranch alone had 70 animals that needed to be evacuated, she said.

"She had a list of people to call, and the people I called were Johnny-on-the-spot," said Carlsbad resident Karen Burrows, who used the service to help her evacuate three horses from Ramona. "They kept me a lot calmer."

In her normal life, White runs an umbrella organization that works with San Diego's humane societies and other animal adoption groups.

"My formal title would be executive director, but we prefer to call me 'Puppy Pimp,' " the Mission Valley resident said.

That's because she's the one who appears on local television, showing off adoptable animals and urging people to consider adding them to their families.

White didn't plan to become an animal evacuation coordinator, but after realizing Monday that there was a need ----- two TV reporters called her asking for help evacuating their horses ---- she stepped forward.

Using the foundation's press contacts, she announced her availability, and "immediately, I got hundreds of phone calls," she said.

Many came from people who just wanted to help someone in distress.

"All these good Samaritans were calling me. I did not sleep for two days, literally," she said.

The offers came from well outside the county limits ---- people from San Francisco and even Colorado called, saying they had brought their trailers into the region and were standing by, she said.

Eventually, White instituted a system where people would leave messages saying what they needed or what they could do to help. She created master lists and linked people in need with multiple assistance offers, allowing them to chose what worked best for them.

She's still getting calls requesting assistance.

"I'm trying to find a house that can take nine dogs," she said late Friday afternoon.

There also are people who want to move their horses back to their properties now that most evacuation orders have lifted, and there are people whose homes burned who are looking for long-term help, she said.

White added that she's very worried that the number of animals in humane society shelters will jump a month from now as people learn that rebuilding their homes will be a lengthy process.

"I think that we're going to have an overwhelming amount of pets in our shelters ... that can't go back," she said. "I think in a month that's when we're really going to feel the pain."

To contact the San Diego Animal Support Foundation, call (619) 847-8755.

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