More than fifteen years ago a woman with a big, soft heart and a fondness for furry creatures got a call from someone who needed help in finding a home for an unwanted pet. Many hours and many phone calls later, with the help of a small, dedicated band of folks with an equally soft spot in their hearts, that lucky pet found a new home and he had Jane Stonehill and her friends to thank. Since then, Jane, a longtime Idyllwild resident, has been finding homes for lost, abandoned, and unwanted pets through an organization that has become known as ARF.  As soon as she gets a call—and calls often come in the middle of the night or the wee ours of the morning—Jane rushes to the rescue and the work begins. Often animals require veterinary attention and Jane sees to it that they get the care they need, regardless of cost or effort. For many years, more times than not, those vet bills were paid for out of Jane’s own pocket.  In addition to emergency veterinary care, ARF provides other important services, including finding temporary and permanent homes for abandoned, homeless, or unwanted animals (or those that cannot be cared for by their owners for many reasons); spay and neuter information and assistance where needed (all placed animals are either spayed or neutered); and food when the human companion is unable to provide adequate nutrition. Another very important service provided by ARF is reuniting lost pets with their owners.  For many years ARF was loosely organized as a small network of caring people who would do what they could to help out when an animal was rescued. Recently, some of those caring individuals reproached Jane about turning ARF into a bona-fide non-profit organization that could legally raise funds through various means to offset the costs incurred on behalf of the rescues.  For several years, Jane has written a column for the Town Crier, Idyllwild’s weekly newspaper, where she profiles animals that have been found and are in need of homes and updates readers on animal placements.

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