Lowcountry Dog Rescue Spotlight: Eunoia Rescue

WRITTEN BY: ALYSSA HELMS, Social Media Manager

I am sure we have all thought about how much time, effort, and money is required and needed to run an animal rescue, keep it running, and make it successful. Hali Selert is the new president of Eunoia Rescue and is dedicated to saving animals’ lives by pulling them from local shelters, finding suitable foster homes, and placing them in their forever homes. Hali was the very first foster for Eunoia Rescue. She slowly took on more and more responsibility over the years and adopted her pittie, Winnie, from Eunoia in 2016. Rescue work is not always easy. Lowcountry Dog Magazine has been involved with Eunoia from the very start in a number of ways. We partner with Eunoia through countless adoption events, fostering dozens of dogs, helping with transportation, donating and raising money, promoting, and more…Lowcountry Dog is proud to know this relationship has resulted in quite a few happy tails and that rewarding feeling is what rescue is all about. Almost everyone at Lowcountry Dog past and present has either fostered, volunteered, or adopted from Eunoia Rescue.

Alicia Williams, a friend and former writer for the magazine, founded Eunoia Rescue back in September of 2015. In the spring of 2021, Alicia stepped down from this massively responsible job and passed the torch to Hali. Hali juggles countless daily tasks for the rescue– she manages the rescue’s social media and website, oversees intakes, handles adoptions, coordinates medical appointments, and so many other things. Hali and many others in rescue organizations also have day jobs. When she’s not working as a criminal defense attorney or juggling rescue tasks, she’s spending time with her two pups, Winnie and Ripley, and her fiance, Tal.

Running a rescue means dealing with the non-stop duties the rescue may demand and always being on-call. If Hali - or anyone on the planet - had to do this all alone it would be impossible. She couldn’t do it without Vice President Nicki Shriver and Foster Coordinator Avery Ivey, who help handle the dayto-day operations of Eunoia. Also along for the ride is Rachel Ballenger who manages supplies and donations; Leslie Rider, who is the medical guru of the bunch; Hollie Xu, who keeps track of registering microchips; Lenzee Newman; who coordinates getting the photos and biographies for available animals together; Mackenzie Ivey, who is the rescue’s photographer; and many, many more people who step up to make sure Eunoia is running as efficiently as possible! Not to mention the countless foster families who house Eunoia’s animals; puppies, seniors, recovering medical cases, and hospice dogs – they take in as many as they can fit, actively care for, and love.

Hali Selert, President of Eunoia Rescue

Eunoia is a foster-based rescue organization and got its name from the definition behind it. Eunoia is a Greek word that means “beautiful thinking” and was used by Aristotle to refer to an indefinable feeling of goodwill and kindness that emanates from certain people, much like the feelings of those behind Eunoia Rescue and all of their fosters and supporters willing to contribute to the saving and well being of animals, allowing the rescue to grow exponentially since 2015. Eunoia Rescue’s mission is to spare the lives of beloved dogs and cats from high-kill shelters and place them in harmonious and life-changing environments provided by foster homes, ultimately finding their forever homes. Giving one animal the chance to be in a foster home saves another animal’s life by opening that space in the shelter. Over time, being in a shelter manifests in a wide number of stressors, regardless of how amazing the shelter may be. The dogs in kennels disengage and eventually lose trust of humans and hope of a life of love. Eunoia’s purpose, along with many other rescue groups, is to give that hope back to the animals and allow them a brighter future.

Generally, Eunoia Rescue takes in the overlooked and the forgotten. They pull animals from euthanasia lists at over-capacity shelters, tough medical cases, and injured animals that wouldn’t be treated and cared for by most other groups. They are also known for freeing dogs from hoarding and neglect cases. Hali says, “It can be the most rewarding to see some of the more broken ones with crazy stories find their way to their forever people.” In 2021, Eunoia was made aware of a breeding-gone-bad situation that started as two dogs. They were left to fend for themselves and over five years that number multiplied to about 130…completely taking up a small, fencedin backyard in North Carolina. Most were Pugs, a handful of Pekingese and of course some mixed of the two. They were all seized little by little and Eunoia was able to pick up seventeen of these dogs after the Eunoia foster community stepped up to help get these poor dogs spread out and back to health, after foster families were all set in place by the power of social media. It took the rescue and clinic over thirty hours to get all seventeen vetted as many had severe skin and ear infections, and nails so long they were starting to curl under and grow into their paw pads.

In July of 2021, Eunoia Rescue helped in a hoarding case in North Carolina, 17 of the pugs and pug mixes were transported to Charleston and placed in foster homes, including one who was fostered by Lowcountry Dog.

Jess, Hali’s current long-term foster is another example of the type of dog Eunoia seeks to help. Jess came to Eunoia as a parvo survivor. Since her puppyhood was spent in an isolation ward of a shelter, she lacked proper socialization and confidence. Eunoia entrusted a “trainer” to help get Jess in a position of being adoptable. Unfortunately in April of 2021 Jess was seized along with 40 other animals from that “trainer’s” home by Kershaw County Animal Control.

Hali says “Jess was skin and bones, you could see every rib, every notch on her spine, her eyes were sunken in, her fur was dull. She was a dog on the verge of death,” when she first came to her. She was also much worse behaviorally than she was before training– she wouldn’t allow anyone to touch her for the first month she was at Hali’s house. After several months of both physical and mental rehabilitation, Jess was ready for actual training. Hali enlisted the help of Canine Revolution Dog Training to actually train Jess, and repair the damage that had been done with the fake trainer. Jess is now back with Hali and is getting closer and closer to being ready to find her forever home.

These are just two of the most jaw-dropping, recent rescues that Eunoia has made, but every one of their stories matter.

Eunoia Rescue is a pro-peace, all love, non-profit bound by kind hearts, a continuous drive to rescue, and the never ending need for it. Hali says they are extremely thankful for all of the donations and help they receive and that they will never turn down unopened bags of food, treats, beds, crates, etc. and you can also help monetarily, if you would like to donate to the health and care of Eunoia’s rescues, any amount helps. Hali also says “If you’re thinking about fostering, there is no better time than now… [fosters] are the ones who really make this possible, without them we wouldn’t have anywhere for the animals to go, so we wouldn’t be able to take animals.” If you would like to save an animal and become a part of Eunoia Rescue’s ever growing family, head to the rescue’s website to find applications to foster and adopt, and all the ways to get involved: eunoiarescue.org ■