The Sato Project is dedicated to rescuing abused and abandoned dogs in Puerto Rico. Since our inception in 2011, we have rescued over 3,000 dogs, rehabilitated them with the highest standards of veterinary care and placed them in loving homes in the mainland U.S. We are also addressing the underlying causes of overpopulation, abandonment and abuse through community outreach and low-cost spay/neuter initiatives.
There are an estimated 500,000 stray dogs on the island of Puerto Rico. The few municipal animal shelters on the island have a euthanasia rate of over 95%. The Sato Project primarily works in the municipality of Yabucoa, one of the island's poorest. Without access to and education about veterinary care, most animals are not spayed, neutered or vaccinated. The hundreds of thousands of stray dogs on the island suffer greatly from severe neglect, disease, injuries, and often abuse.
The Sato Project aims to make permanent change in Puerto Rico through a threefold mission: 1. rescuing, rehabilitating and rehoming abandoned and abused dogs, and 2. addressing the underlying causes of overpopulation, abandonment, and abuse through community outreach and a low-cost spay, neuter, vaccine and microchip Program. 3. bringing national attention to the problem of abandoned and abused dogs in Puerto Rico.
Our ultimate guiding vision a Puerto Rico with no more stray dogs, where 'satos' are loved and revered, and all are vetted, spayed and neutered. Our goal is to create an effective service model of rescue, community outreach and spay/neuter in Yabucoa, to achieve and sustain a documentable impact on the stray population, that will ultimately serve as a model for replication in communities across Puerto Rico.
