Dallas Animal Welfare Group, or The DAWG Project,was founded in 2016 by a group of friends in response to the loose and stray dog crisis in southern Dallas.
A generations-old problem, the issue was brought into sharp relief by the death of Antoinette Brown, a homeless US Army veteran who was mauled to death by six loose dogs after walking into a vacant lot in May of that year. A subsequent census estimated 7,000 - 9,000 loose or stray dogs in southern Dallas. The count on the same day in North Dallas? One.
The city of Dallas began sweeps to pick up loose dogs - for their safety and for the safety of the citizens of southern Dallas. As the shelter began to fill, dogs were euthanized for space. This is a hard reality in municipal shelters.
DAWG was founded to provide a positive outcome for Dallas shelter dogs and to fill the gaps in animal rescue to move the city of Dallas toward becoming a no-kill community.