By Sophia Cooper | scooper@alextimes.com
When Jennifer Kloehn and her fiance went to the Animal Welfare League of Alexandria on a random Sunday, they were planning to learn more about walking dogs and volunteering. Forty-eight hours later, they brought home Luna, a gray pit bull who came to the AWLA after being abandoned at an Alexandria playground.
This year, the AWLA is celebrating 80 years of work in Alexandria. Before the organization’s founding, the city had a “dog pound” which housed hundreds of animals in a very small building. The conditions were so bad that Alexandria residents broke into the building to attempt to free the dogs.
An Oct. 22 Facebook post from the AWLA about the milestone referenced a 1946 article from The Washington Daily which called the dog pound a “small, unpainted fire-trap.” A group of Alexandria residents came together and formed the AWLA to create better conditions and care for the animals.
“They were going in and trying to break out the dogs,” Erin Shackelford, AWLA senior manager of communications and marketing, told the Times. “They were breaking in and trying to free them. So they realized that that probably wasn’t the best solution.”
The AWLA was founded as an animal shelter on June 28, 1946, and will be celebrating its 80th anniversary at the Torpedo Factory Thursday.
It has been contracted by the City of Alexandria to operate as the city’s animal shelter and provide animal control services since 1989. It also provides support services, including adoptions, outside of the city contract.
In 2019, the AWLA created a community programs department to provide resources, including pet food, to pet owners in the city.
Kloehn told the Times she had always wanted a pit bull and found out Luna had become available for adoption the day she and her fiance visited the AWLA.
“The moment we met her, there was an instant connection, and we went home that night and I couldn’t stop thinking about her,” she said.
They returned to the AWLA and adopted her the next day. Kloehn said Luna is “super loving and super sweet” and loves to run around and “do zoomies.”
Having Luna as part of her family has changed Kloehn’s life, she said.
“A lot of the activities that we’ll now do really center on involving Luna, so we’ll go on hikes, or maybe we’ll go to farmers markets or just really any activity that allows dogs,” she said, “so that she can be part of our weekend adventures and activities.”
Shackelford said AWLA is more than just an animal shelter. Just over half of AWLA staff, according to Shackelford, is in a community programs-related position.
“They’re truly working to help people retain ownership of their pet, help keep pets with the people who love them,” she said. “So I think that truly is the biggest evolution in terms of the AWLA.”
Alexandria, according to Shackelford, is at the forefront of animal welfare and will continue to be. She added that the AWLA staff look forward to potentially modifying the current city-owned AWLA building or building a new one to allow the nonprofit to offer more to the community.
She mentioned that the AWLA is limited in its current building and performs surgical procedures in a mobile van nicknamed “Waggin’ Wheels.”
“While it works, it’s not the ideal situation,” she said.
The AWLA cares for dogs, cats, rabbits and other small animals. Shackelford mentioned that the nonprofit has cared for hamsters, snakes, geckos, bearded dragons, fish, turtles and ferrets, too.
Shackelford said Alexandria does not have an animal overpopulation issue, which she believes is a testament to the work that the AWLA does.
“We offer spay and neuter, we offer vaccines [and] we offer people the ability to care for their pets and be responsible pet owners,” she said.
In 2025, the AWLA received a grant for $100,000 from PetSmart charities to focus on neighborhoods near the Mark Center that lack access to veterinary care.
“The grant allowed them to start hosting community focus groups and figuring out how we could help better address the barriers that they were facing and accessing veterinary care,” Shackelford said.
This year, the AWLA was awarded $600,000 from PetSmart charities and named the nonprofit of the year by The Chamber ALX.
“I think that goes to show [that] larger organizations are recognizing the work we’re doing in the community and wanting to support it,” Shackelford said.
The AWLA is currently increasing awareness about what pet-inclusive housing looks like.
“The number one reason people surrender animals is because they’ve lost their housing or their housing doesn’t allow the animal,” Shackelford said. “So many apartment complexes in this area say, ‘Oh, we’re pet friendly, but you can’t have a dog that looks like a pit bull. You can’t have a dog that’s over 30 pounds. You can’t have a chow. So it’s not pet-inclusive.’”
Shackelford said people often don’t realize the amount of care that the AWLA staff gives to the animals.
“Our animal care technicians [are] in there every single day doing the hard job, cleaning up, making sure animals get fed and get taken out,” she said. “And so I think they’re kind of the unsung heroes of any animal care organization.”
Shackelford said she is impressed by the volunteers’ commitment to the animals.
“We have so many great volunteers coming in and taking our dogs out that you look at the walk board on the back, and you see that a dog is getting a walk every hour,” she said. “Sometimes I joke that the dogs are probably like, ‘Just give me a minute to take a break.’”
Kloehn, who volunteers at the organization, said she believes the AWLA is an “amazing organization” which gave Luna a second chance at life.
“We just [want to] help amplify what they do because the work that they do is really super important to the community and really helps rescue dogs and shelter dogs in general,” she said.
Kloehn said the AWLA has had a major impact on the city.
“Whenever you adopt a dog, they’re a member of the family and they’re essentially like a baby,” she said. “People who have adopted dogs or other pets through them, it’s changed their lives.”
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