The Team

Founder & President of Empathy For Animals, Alyssa Oakes, is an avid animal rights advocate, animal rescuer and passionate vegan. She's originally from Cortland, OH and pursued further education in Pittsburgh, PA at Duquesne University where she received her Graduate Degree in Finance and MBA with a focus in Sustainable business practices. 

She aims to cause the least harm possible to all animals while working towards creating a kinder and more compassionate world around us. 

Aside from rescuing stray & feral cats, Alyssa enjoys spending time with her beloved fur children. She has 6 rescue dogs (Scofield, Lincoln, Mario, Layla, Taco, Titan) & 4 cats (Sasha, Benji, Salem, Scrump).

After rescuing homeless cats for several years with her two rescue partners, Tracy & Jake, she realized there was a great need to create a rescue organization dedicated to fostering, vetting and finding loving homes for those in greatest need. She found adult stray cats are often overlooked while kittens are more favored for adoption so she never passes by giving adult stray cats a second chance. While being committed to those in greatest need, she and her team, are firmly against euthanizing an animal if they are not in a state of true suffering. Alyssa works with sincere drive to find forever homes for any of their foster cats with Feline Leukemia &/or Feline Immunodeficiency Virus as well as accepting and rallying for other special needs such as Cerebellar Hypoplasia, Radial Hypoplasia, tripods, etc. 

Her love & respect for life of all animals began by volunteering walking dogs at the local pound and grew into a passion to save those who couldn't save themselves. 

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