While pouring the foundations for the purpose-built Pet Refuge animal shelter, charity queen Julie Chapman took a moment to place some special items in the concrete – silver spoons from her mum’s collection, a treasured photo of her late parents and an etching of their names, Alice and Kenneth Helson.
It was a quiet homage to her mum and dad, whose generous inheritance from the sale of their home allowed Julie to realise her dream of helping animals in Aotearoa through her new charity Pet Refuge.
“I would love for Mum and Dad to see the shelter, but it wouldn’t exist if they hadn’t passed away. Unless I won Lotto, I wouldn’t have been able to do this, so absolutely, this is their legacy,” shares Julie, 49, who is best known for her work as the founder and CEO of Kids Can, the country’s leading charity dedicated to providing the essentials to Kiwi kids affected by poverty.
Her latest brainchild, Pet Refuge, is a unique animal shelter which provides loving and free housing and care for pets affected by domestic violence while their owners and families escape abusive relationships and set up their lives again.
“At first, I jokingly said to my dad I was thinking of spending all the inheritance on shoes and handbags because I have a bit of a penchant for those,” she recalls. “But when I told him the idea for Pet Refuge, he was pretty emotional about it.
Julie with Dad Kenneth.
“Mum had motor neuron disease and passed away four months earlier, and he told me, ‘I think your mum would be really on board with this idea. She would love it.'” With that blessing, Julie knew she was on the right track.
Julie’s dream was made possible by her beloved late parents Alice and Kenneth.
New Zealand has a high rate of domestic violence – police attend a family harm or violence call out every four minutes – and the second highest rate of pet ownership in the OECD.
“Together that’s a bad recipe,” says Julie, who discovered while researching the project that pets are regularly a barrier to people leaving abusive relationships.
A 2018 Women’s Refuge survey of women whose partners had abused or threatened their pets also found 53 percent delayed leaving family violence out of fear for their pet’s safety.
Pet Refuge can shelter 20 cats, 16 dogs, has an area for birds and smaller pets like rabbits and guinea pigs, and also works with external providers to take in larger pets like horses.
“Since we opened one year ago, we’ve helped 175 pets and families to escape abuse, and reunited over 100 pets with their families in their safe forever homes,” shares Julie. “Our shelter had been at capacity for months, but you cannot say no to someone who has run away with a cat or dog to the park or a police officer saying a woman needs to go to hospital but won’t unless her pet is safe,” explains Julie.
With an ever-increasing need for their services and no government funding, this month Pet Refuge launched an urgent appeal for donations to keep operating, and in the future expand with goals for another shelter in the North Island and one in the South Island too.
Happy hound day! They may be missing their owners, but these lucky canines got to share in Pet Refuge’s first birthday celebrations.
Julie has 18 years of experience running Kids Can, but she’s adamant none of it would be possible without her dedicated team of staff, Board of Trustees and support from the Trillian Trust and the Lindsay Foundation.
“My philosophy has always been to hire people better than myself and we really do have the best teams.”
“I hire people better than myself,” says Julie of her team.
With her extremely busy career, Julie reveals it’s her husband Cain, 51, and their many pets that bring the self-described introvert comfort and calm at the end of a long day.
“Cain’s very black and white, and keeps me grounded when I need it, but he’s also my biggest backer in what I need to do. He’s the ying to my yang,” says Julie of her husband of 11 years.
Cain, an engineer, and Julie first dated as teenagers, but went their separate ways and married others before reconnecting at a later stage of life. Julie believes they were always meant to be.
Luckily, husband Cain shares her love of animals.
The Auckland couple are both life-long animal lovers and share their home with a menagerie of mostly rescued pets, including 12 cats, three dogs, seven goats, some chickens and a turkey.
When they’re not tuning in to Shortland Street, Julie’s guilty pleasure, you’ll often find them at Pet Refuge helping walk the shelter dogs there too.
It’s a busy life, but looking to the future Julie has no plans to slow down any time soon.
“For me, it’s about creating a sustainable organisation that can exist long after I’m wheeled out of there with all my shoes and handbags!”
