Tony La Russa works to provide service dogs for U.S. Veterans
Tony La Russa is the former baseball player and manager of the St. Louis Cardinals, Oakland Athletics and Chicago White Sox. He currently works in an executive capacity with the the Boston Red Sox. Something that is important to the entire La Russa family is their Animal Rescue Foundation, also known as ARF. A huge component of their work involves their Pets and Vets initiative.
ARF is now engaged in the Service Dog Salute campaign that supports pairing veterans with rescue-turned-service dogs. What's great about this program is that it helps the veterans and the animals that need homes to get adopted.
PTSD affects many of our veterans and they return to their lives and have a tough time adjusting. For many, service animals help them improve. But, the process of training a service animal is time-consuming and can be expensive.
It costs around $15,000 to train a service dog. ARF developed a ten-month training program where vets are actively involved with training their own service animal.
ARF is committed to turning rescue dogs into service dogs. These animals aren't simple pets. They provide veterans with companionship, stability and have been proven to lower the anxiety and depression associated with people suffering from PTSD.
Tony La Russa, the baseball Hall of Famer and noted animal activist was joined by trainer/veteran Daniell Kimbrell and service dog Katie to talk about Animal Rescue Foundation, what Purina Dog Chow is doing to help this project, why providing service animals is important, why so many baseball players return to the game in a different capacity when they are no longer on the field, what are his predictions for this season of baseball and more.
See this fascinating interview here:
Tony La Russa and the Animal Rescue Foundation can be found here.
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