A little R & aRf
Tara McKibben of Youngstown, who has multiple sclerosis, sits with her pet dogs Suka, Hiko, and her canine helper, April. McKibben hopes to raise $1,000 for Canine Partners for Life of Pennsylvania. If she raises the most money, April will get a day off from assisting McKibben.
April gets ready to turn on the light switch for Tara McKibben of Youngstown.
CANINE PARTNERS FOR LIFE
The 21-year-old organization near Philadelphia trains and places assistance dogs with individuals who suffer from mobility and cognitive impairments.
Trains several kinds of dogs, including service and seizure-alert animals, as well as home and residential companions.
Recipients come from all walks of life and have a wide array of disabilities such as multiple sclerosis, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, heart disease, spinal-cord injuries and seizure disorders.
Places animals with people from all over the nation.
Dogs undergo comprehensive training up to two years to meet the specific needs of their human partners.
Runs a prison puppy-raising program to teach inmates in six correctional institutions to raise and train the puppies during their first year of life.
Has a staff of 17 full- and part-time employees and hundreds of volunteers.
Source: Canine Partners for Life
A city woman hopes to raise $1,000 to give her service dog a day off
By SEAN BARRON
YOUNGSTOWN
Opening doors, putting on a pair of socks, placing clothing in a washing machine and dryer and adding silverware to a dishwasher are among the daily tasks most people perform reflexively.
But for Tara McKibben, those and many other daily functions are anything but routine.
“I have a wonderful relationship with April,” McKibben said recently from her Goleta Avenue home on the city’s North Side. “I don’t know what I’d do without her.”
McKibben, a former registered nurse who was diagnosed in 1981 with multiple sclerosis, is referring to her black Labrador retriever which she got more than three years ago from a Cochranville, Pa.-based nonprofit organization called Canine Partners for Life.
The organization’s main purpose is to train and place service and home-companion dogs with people who have physical disabilities to help improve their independence and quality of life.
Canine Partners, founded in 1989, is having its second annual Dog’s Day Off fundraiser through June 30. The assistance dog of the person who raises the most money will get a day off, and human volunteers will fill in for the animal.
McKibben’s goal this year is to raise $1,000 for CPL, most of which will go toward training more dogs to aid people with MS, cerebral palsy, heart disease and other conditions, she noted.
It costs the organization roughly $22,000 per dog for two years’ worth of training. Canine Partners donates the animals after they go through the program but asks recipients to pay for necessary equipment based on their income, McKibben said, adding that such costs almost never exceed $3,000.
To that end, McKibben said she paid about $900 for equipment such as a harness for balance and carrying items, backpacks and a halti, a device she places around her dog’s nose that attaches to its collar. The halti helps McKibben steer her 65-pound dog, she said.
Other tasks April assists with include picking up items from the floor, placing containers and bottles into recycling bins and bags, carrying and placing silverware on the table, turning lights on and off and bringing her TV remote-control, phone, leg brace and shoes, she explained.
Once weaned and before entering the two-year training program, the dogs go to a home for puppies or one of the facilities CPL uses for prison-training programs.
During the first year, the animals receive basic obedience training and learn certain commands. Also included are socialization, as well as mastering skills such as going up and down stairs, McKibben explained.
The dogs return to their kennels for specialized training in the second year. That includes walking with a person who uses a wheelchair, opening doors, calling an elevator and knowing what to do in restaurants and other public settings, she noted, adding that the animals also are tested for hip dysplasia, a common genetic disease in many large-breed dogs.
“They usually recommend training one task at a time,” McKibben pointed out. “If training more than one at a time, it can be overwhelming and confusing for the dog.”
Before placement, efforts are made to match the personalities of the dog and person, McKibben said. In addition, dogs’ temperament and intelligence are taken into account, she added.
To McKibben, April represents far more than the sum of the dog’s abilities and special talents, however.
“She provides me with so much joy and so much emotional support. I’m far more outgoing now than before I had her,” she explained.
To help McKibben reach her goal, send donations to Canine Partners for Life, P.O. Box 170, Cochranville, Pa., 19330-0170. Specify that the contribution is for April.