Welcome to the Kindness Chronicles, where we hope to inject the world with a dose of the Minnesota Nice that it desperately needs. It is Shark Week, or our version of Shark Week this week. Animal Week, John, not Shark Week. It's Animal Week. Yeah, yeah. Um, we've had a, uh, a fantastic response to, uh, Animal Week. And, uh, we have another person who has a, uh, relationship. With animals, and we're gonna get into that in just a second, but we're here with Steve Brown. Hello.
Uh, Kevin Gorg. Howdy. Uh, Mario Esteb, our, uh, intern that we're paying in chicken nuggets. And, uh, I would like to In studio. In studio. Yes. All together. We're in a 10x10 studio. It's about 140 degrees in here. I've had too much coffee. I'm just jumpy and excited. Um, but I would like to introduce an old friend of mine, uh, Jane Ridholm. Her name was Jane Pryne when I knew her back in law school.
And Jane, Jane was responsible for, well let's just say this, when we graduated, Jane had a whole bunch of like cords and stuff on her gown and I didn't know what that was all about. She graduated summa something, magna something, I just graduated. But a lot of it had to do with Jane helping me get through that damn experience. Jane was a lot brighter than I was, um, well you were, I mean let's face it. Well it's the Kindness Chronicle so she extended kindness to you. You're being very generous.
I wish I, uh, didn't have to be so generous because, uh, But yeah, I, uh, I am grateful to Jane because Jane played a significant role in me, uh, graduating from law school. Jane, I know that you worked as an attorney for a while. I remember we called you once upon a time for an, uh, for an immigration, uh, situation. We had a woman from Bosnia living with us illegally. Yup. It's out there. It's out there now. It's out there. Oh, it's all starting now.
And, uh, we, it just was such a challenge to get her. To not be illegal. Yeah, yeah. We eventually got there, but Jane, tell us a little bit about your career and what you're doing now. What the topic of, uh... How a lawyer became involved with, uh, animals. Yeah. Absolutely. Um, well thank you. And thank you all for having us on. We, we appreciate it. Um, you know, so I started my career as, um, an assistant attorney general at the Minnesota Attorney General's Office.
Wow. Um, and I served in the Charities Division. Um, And, you know, my, my heart has been set on the nonprofit world really ever since. Um, so I've been involved in, in nonprofits one way or another. Um, whether I'm working with, um, immigrants, community assistance, or human trafficking victims, that's what I've done along the way. This year, I joined Believe It Canine Service Partners as its executive director. Um, I joined on Valentine's Day and um, and I'm so excited about this organization.
I'm so happy to be here. So we provide custom trained service dogs free of charge to disabled veterans. And in doing that. We allow them to lead more productive lives, more independent lives. They become more engaged with their community. Um, it's a really special organization. Um, and let's see, as of last December, we have placed 50 dogs with veterans. Um, and we are located in Northfield, Minnesota, but we really have veterans come from all over the upper Midwest.
There, there is an intensive training piece to it because these dogs are custom trained. Um, so we mainly have veterans from the Midwest, but occasionally we do have veterans from all over the nation, really. Um, but we were founded by Sam Daly and he is here with us today. Um, I would love for Sam to share his story if he's interested in doing so. Oh, Sam's with us. sir.
Oh, hi, Sam. sam started the organization in, And I would love for him to share his story, um, about how it came to be because it's a really unique one. Um, but for in my case, I was looking for a change. I wasn't necessarily work looking to work directly with animals, although I have been involved in animal rescue for a long time. Um, but this. Physician really spoke to me because my dad, um, is a Vietnam veteran, um, my grandpa served in World War II.
I've always supported veterans, um, and I've always worked to, uh, empower people to, to, to become more than what they currently are. And so this really fits, um, Is Sam a veteran? Yeah, Sam, Sam was the one who started it all. Sam, tell us your story. Okay, um, so, my name is Sam Daly and I'm originally from Northfield.
Um, I started a dog training business, uh, 30 plus years ago, and in, in, uh, 2010, I was recruited by a company in North Carolina to train explosive detection dogs for the Marine Corps. And so, if you kind of remember what the economy was like coming out of 2008 and 9, um, 2010 was a pretty good time for an opportunity like this. So, uh, my wife and I agreed. And I moved to, um, to Southern Plains, North Carolina.
And so we trained, um, about 600 dogs over a five year period there, uh, to detect explosives on the battlefield in Afghanistan. And so that, those were the, the main threat, uh, to U. S. forces. And our partners there, uh, were, um, improvised explosive devices, um, hidden explosives. And so we trained these dogs in North Carolina, and then we moved to the, uh, military bases where I was at Camp Pendleton for quite some time and at Camp Lejeune, uh, quite some time.
And we, we trained with the Marines on their bases. And in my case, then I was attached to the 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines and deployed to Afghanistan with them in 2012. And so that was very surreal for me. Um, you know, my, my parents met in the Navy, uh, at the end of World War II in San Diego, uh, they went to school on the GI bill, both became teachers, uh, raised a big family on a farm here in Southern Minnesota. It's a great American story, really.
Um, my oldest brother, Tom, uh, is a retired master sergeant. Uh, he's an army, army medic. And so we have some, some attached, you know, we're attached to the, the military service and so certainly attached to dogs and animals. So that's how, uh, this evolved. Just to be clear, so you, would you be considered like a civilian contractor? Exactly. Yeah. And you ended up in Afghanistan? right. I was, I was attached to the unit. Oh wow. Um, as what they call a, um, a forward support representative.
Um, I've, I've lived with Marines, I've slept in the dirt with them. Uh, I wore their uniform, carried a weapon. Wow. Holy cow. When, when on, when on patrol with them. Geez. Uh, in, uh, Hellman Province, Afghanistan. Oh God. And, uh, the dogs were, the dogs were very successful. Uh, they, uh, were, you know, tremendously good at their jobs. They found, uh, you know, bombs and explosives every day. I mean, maybe not every day, but every week, certainly, and sometimes several in one day.
And at the same time, back at the Forward Operating Base, the dogs provided a lot of joy and comfort for these Marines that were a long way from home. And so that was one of the connections for me after that service. I did go for a second deployment in 2013 with a different unit. Um, but then after that, we came back in 2014. I actually spoke at a Rotary Club meeting and a gentleman there came up to me afterwards and said, Have you ever thought of training service dogs for veterans?
I said, yes, we've thought about it. Um, I don't know how to set up that business and how to get that rolling. And he said, I've set up many businesses. I'll set it up for you if you'll run it. And so that's, that's how we started. And so we started in 2014, incorporated in 2015, but it's just a way for. It was a way for me to continue to serve veterans and to serve the community through something that I was very strong in, which is, you know, the animal part with the dogs.
I first must acknowledge that you go on a business trip, so to speak, and you're in Afghanistan, and I'm bitching about driving to Duluth tomorrow. So, that's different. Um, just curiously, what kind of dogs, what breed of dogs do you typically... We gotta picture it. We primarily use Labradors and Labrador Cross Nix's dogs. We do, adopt dogs from animal shelters that we use in our program.
Um, there's a lot of, uh, Labrador crosses, Golden Retriever crosses, Pit Bull crosses we've been pretty successful with. Um, there's certainly plenty of those. Um, it's, it's not, not for every dog as you, as you would imagine that, uh, we have to have a dog that's got a certain amount of ambition that will, uh, that's willing to work.
And, uh, also a dog that is a team player, uh, that has some degree of trainability so that they can go to, Uh, they're, uh, a veteran's place of work, on the airplane, in the grocery store, a medical appointment, anything like that, wherever they need to go, that they will be stable in those environments. And not every dog is, obviously, but, um, so that's, that's how we get them. And uh, we do have some people that also donate dogs to us and, uh, those are, that's very helpful too.
So there's a lot of demand, a lot of demand for what we do. Um, unfortunately, we have. Two veterans a week are committing suicide in Minnesota alone. So what we're offering is a chance to have a non chemical and a non drug therapy that will help relieve the symptoms of post traumatic stress, military sexual trauma, moral injury. And physical injuries, uh, so that these folks can lead a more normal, freedom filled life, uh, without so many drugs.
Just curiously, do you do any work with, Neal Loidolt over at MACV? Yes. Yeah, his wife is on our board of directors. Oh, you're kidding! Yep. Yeah, MACV is an organization that Minnesota Masonic Charities has supported, uh, for many, many years, and Neil is just a terrific guy. I think he's a... He's a retired general and he's President and CEO of MACV, which is Minnesota Assistant Council for Veterans, and they, they work a lot on veteran homelessness issues and stuff like that.
I just have to really quick, KG, you've got a couple of dogs. Yeah. From Wayne Brooks. I'm not sure I could picture them in Afghanistan. I'm not sure they'd make it, but I'll tell you what. They are as loyal as two dogs that you ever want to see. That is true. They're morky dogs, so they're little guys. They're little morkies. They're 15 pounds. But, I'm a first time dog owner, so these two guys are the first dogs I've ever had. And they've changed my life.
They are, the unconditional love you get from a dog, or dogs, every day, is life changing. So when you're speaking to these, connection with these folks that need it so much, I get it. I understand it. And I think it's remarkable. Um, what some of these dogs can do, you know, I've, I've seen, you know, whether it's the today show, uh, I know I've seen it on the CBS, uh, the morning show on Sundays, they've shown, you know, footage of these dogs that are in the battlefield and what they do.
It is unbelievable the work they do. I have a, I have a question for you. How long does it take to train these dogs? Do they have to be like puppies before you can get them kind of trained to be companion dogs? Just to be clear, we're talking now about the dogs that are. working with veterans, not the dogs in Afghanistan, either way. I mean, there's a training process, right? Both. Okay. So I guess, I guess more, more current talking about their, their organization.
How long does it take to train the dogs to be companion dogs? Yeah, that's right. And, and frankly, we've adopted some of the Marine Corps, uh, standard operating procedures for that schedule. So for instance, um, our bomb dog in Afghanistan has to be certified Now ready to deploy by the time they're age three or else they're considered too old for the program. Okay. That was my, that's kind of what I was getting to. Okay, cool. Yep. And so for our program, it's the same thing.
We, if we can't train, and place one of our service dogs by age three. We kind of feel like we're not doing due diligence with our donors money. And so we want to make sure that we get good service, length of service out of these dogs. And so our program is about 18 months. Two years is about kind of on the outside. Uh, for the length of the, the training and the placement. And, and who train, do you personally train these dogs? Yes, so we, we do all the, the training right here in house.
So the dogs come in as puppies, they go to a foster home for puppies, and about eight to nine months old, they come into our training center full time. And then you put about a year's training onto that, and then we bring in the veteran client. And the veteran trained for about three months with the dog. They have to do 120 hours. Uh, which they can do at their, uh, convenience, really. So some do it full time and get it knocked out.
And some just take, you know, two or three months to get it knocked out. And they have to pass the public access test at the end. And so, that's, uh, those are our standards. But usually, um, 18 months to two years, we'll do it. I just wanted to add that, um, our facility is really unique. It's set up so the dog can learn how to meet a veteran's needs. So there's a bedroom area, there's a kitchen, there is a restaurant area.
Um, in fact, you know, one of our veterans showed that, um, after getting his dog, he was able to go to a restaurant for the first time in 17 years. Oh, wow. It made that much of a difference. So, and for example, you know, the bed is there because then the dogs can be trained to do nightmare interruption. And kind of stop that trauma cycle, at night and waking up the veteran and pulling the covers off and turning on the lights, things like that. Just, that's amazing.
Have you guys documented this training? I mean, I would love to watch a show about training. These dogs. It's a great reality show. Seriously. Yeah, well, you know, sometimes reality shows aren't all about reality. Yeah, fair point. There's a little producing involved, yeah.
But honestly, for our listeners, if they have, uh, dogs that they would like to be a part of this program, or they have, uh, family members or friends that are military that need the help, what's the website, what's the spot that our listeners can, can, uh, can find you guys and maybe get the process started down the road? Right. Yeah. Go ahead, Jane. Oh, sure. Sure. Um, we are at believeit. org. So it's believewithat. org and right on our website, you can learn about our program.
There is the, um, eligibility survey for veterans just right there. You can fill that out. Um, it also talks about our needs. So for example, like Sam talked about, we use, um, puppy fosters. If we have puppies that are, that are younger, um, and then we also use weekend fosters. And those are foster families that, as you imagine, would foster the dogs in training on the weekend because they work very hard during the week at our facility.
And then they get to go home to a family during the weekend. Who doesn't want a puppy for the weekend? Yeah, right. Um, and it's a well trained dog for them to right. Um, so, you know, we always, we always need fosters. We also have a lot of events. Um, so we have events listed on our website. We need people to represent us at events. So we have what are called, um, believe it ambassadors. And those are people who go to events and explain what we do.
Um, And, you know, you can, you can learn a lot more by looking at our website. We have a golf tournament coming up in August for anyone who's interested. That'll be a lot of fun. Yeah, yep. Everything's there. What is your annual budget, the organization's annual budget? Are you know, we're in an interesting phase. Okay. Because we are growing. Um, and that's why I was brought on. Okay. Because we have a lot of interest. We have an increasing waiting list.
So we have about 60 veterans on our waiting list right now. Oh, wow. Yep. And, you know, as you can imagine, it takes quite a while to get through that waiting list, so we are actually going to be launching a capital campaign for a larger facility, probably within the next year or two. So, right now, we are like half a million, three quarter million. budget, but, um, that will be expanding pretty soon.
Jane, you know that I've been in the fundraising business since we were in law school, and my specialty is plan giving. And all of the, um, studies have shown that two of the, the spaces that do the best when it comes to plan giving are animal charities. Yep. and veteran charities. Best of both worlds right here. You got the best of both worlds.
From a plan giving perspective, you know, when you've got people that don't have children but are animal lovers, it is hard to compete with animal charities when it comes to uh, those plan giving opportunities. No, I'm serious.
So as you conduct your capital campaign, I would, uh, highly encourage you to, uh, include plan giving as part of, and I'm sure you already have that already figured out, while it's not going to solve today's problems, when you've got a supply and demand imbalance when it comes to the needs of the organization that you, uh, that you serve, or the people that you serve, animals and veterans are winners.
you can expect to, you know, from the, the Kindness Chronicles listeners, you're going to get all kinds of people interested in helping out flowing. That's right. It's going to happen now. We've got good people listening. That's right. Yeah. Well, and I will say too, that, you know, our supporters come from all walks of life and we have, um, supporters who are on fixed income, right. And they give us what they can.
But, you know, with regard to Planned Giving, they may have an estate at some point too, right? Yeah, so definitely, um, yeah, that's absolutely part of our fundraising plan is Planned Giving too. Well, that is fantastic. Let me say one other thing about contacting us is that, although believe it, it's just a brand name that we made up, you know, and trademarks, um, it, it, yeah, if, if people just search, Google search, Minnesota Service Dogs for Veterans will come up. Oh, nice. There you go.
I love the use of words. And when I saw believe that, you know, I look, Oh, believe, you know, vet that's for veterans is for veterinarians. I mean, it's just, I don't know who came up with it, but damn it. That was clever, Sam high five. You must've been high five in yourself when you came up with that one. Little knuckle punch and you, and you went through the whole trademarking process and all that. Yes, we did. Just because we wanted to differentiate ourselves. Love it.
We, I mean, I would love someday to do service dogs for autistic children, things like that. But right now we need to focus on veterans and we just had a 20 year war in Afghanistan wrap up. Uh, you know, there's a lot of need and a lot of demand for what we're doing and, uh, and sometimes it's hard to place a face to a conflict like Afghanistan, uh, when it goes on for 20 years.
Yeah. So, we are putting, uh, we are putting these faces, uh, in our facility here to train them with these service dogs to help them cope with life and help their families and help their community, uh, through this, um, you know, through this method, which is, I mean, what's the worst that could happen, right? Right. I mean, uh, it, it's a trained dog and, um, so there are a lot of medications and other things that these folks take that they're able to eliminate.
Um, reduce and eliminate just through the use of a trained service log. Wow. And so, uh, that's our focus, uh, that's our singular focus at this time. I would imagine that there's been all kinds of wonderful success stories, but if you were to, to pick one story that sort of is the embodiment of, you know, what's your vision for Believe It would be? Can you tell us about that connection that was made between one of these service dogs and a vet?
uh, like Mac V's mission is to end veteran homelessness in Minnesota. our larger, goal is to end veteran suicide in Minnesota. So we had a situation here with, with a retired Marine Corps veteran where, um, he was certain that this particular night was going to be the night that he committed suicide. He was going to take his own life. And he got out of bed and went downstairs and got in his chair and, uh, he was waiting for the right moment, you might say.
And his, his dog came down and got up on his lap. Oh man. got right in his face and just laid on his chest the whole night. And his wife came down and said, uh, what, what's going on? And he said, well, duke didn't want me to kill myself last night. Oh my God. See, that was a good question, guys. Wow. That was a good question. That's a great hell of story. The story's a little better than a question, but yes. That was awesome. My goodness. Isn't that funny how I made this up about me? You did.
You figured. I really, I mean, what a beautiful story. My God. That's really cool. I would imagine that for your capital campaign, that might be one of the stories that be in the, uh, collateral materials chain. Thank you. Just throwing that out there. That is beautiful. Just a dog. Just a dog. Duke. Duke the, the lifesaver. Jeez. Very cool. Literally. Yeah. Sogs are so intuitive, right?
I, that's the one thing I've learned in the 10 years I've spent with Brooks and Fenway is they are so intuitive to what, It's a split second, right? It's a moment in time that the ripple effect is. It's forever. His life now goes on because of Duke. It's, it gives you chills. Just think great. I mean, amazing, powerful story. Great question too, John. Thank you. I appreciate that. Well, I must say that hiring Jane Ridholm as the executive director of anything is a great idea.
I had mentioned earlier that she is the reason I got through law school. Um, you used to have cats. Do you still have cats, Jane? Yes, I have one cat and many dogs now. Okay, so Jane, we used to go over to Jane's apartment and study and she had all kinds of animals roaming around and my wife is mean and won't let us have pets. She's mean. She's mean, but you know, I love the idea. Maybe for the weekend now. I love the idea of the weekend dog. We can do this. This would be a cool thing.
I like that idea too. So when Becky's out of town with all of her friends, I could be a dog guy. Yeah. Just a weekend. You've got a conduit right here. I got you. Like a divorced dad with a dog. You got the kids for the weekend. I'd be good with a dog. You would be. You would be. I'm a dog guy. Just for a couple days. Yeah. Okay. I admire the work that you guys are doing. When Jane reached out to me, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is perfect. You know, this week is shark week.
So it's all about animals and animal week. Not shark week. It's animal week. Yeah. Um, it's like shark week. It's just animal week because it's a podcast. It's our shark week. Okay. I got it. And Jane, um, you know, we were celebrating all this week. The fact that we, uh, have cracked the top 10 for listenership. Yeah. I'm flexin I'm feelin pretty good about it, and, uh, you know, we have an intern now. Just everything is coming together for us.
Over 50 episodes, we have 52 episodes down now, so that's a lot, that's kind of a lot. That's like the, almost the number of dogs that you've, uh, placed with, uh, with veterans. So, we'll have a contest. Oh, no we won't. No we won't. We're just gonna hope to keep building there. They're work because it's, it's amazing work and I hope that our listeners can get involved and I hope that we continue to help these veterans out because it's so important. Yep. Well, um, again, thank you very much.
Uh, any final words of wisdom, uh, that you'd like to impart upon us? Well, I was going to say thank you so much for having us on. And it's great to connect with you, John. I'll catch up. Do you have a question, KG? No. What are you pointing for? Let's give them both a chance to talk. Okay, I'm sorry. I just love hearing my... Yeah, go ahead, Sam. Sam, sorry, Sam. No, no worries at all.
I just wanted to say, you know, that a lot of people think that our program is about dogs, and it certainly is, uh, fundamentally involved with dogs, but really what we're, what we're dealing with are veterans, their families, their employers. Their churches, their communities, um, that's what we're trying to improve, uh, through the use of a trained service builder. Brilliant. Beautiful work, man.
Congratulations on what you're doing and where this is going, and I hope this podcast will point some people in the right direction and continue to grow, um, the great work you guys are doing. All right. Well, thank you very much. Thank you. Thanks, guys. And, uh, once again, off we go.