Cat Kids Rescue Inc — Local services in Seminole

I use to think that this rescue was one of the great ones and would highly recommend them as my family has adopted 2 cats from them over the past 4 years, an Orange Tabby and a Bombay. However, after last night my opinion of this rescue has drastically changed, I no longer think highly of this organization, and will no longer recommend this rescue to anyone. Last night my 15 year old daughter fell in love with a kitten at the Tyrone Petsmart and it seemed that the kitten had chosen my daughter also. Those of you who have adopted a cat before know and understand that the person doesn’t choose the kitten/cat, but the kitten/cat chooses the person. My daughter was ready to pay the $90 adoption fee with her own money and my wife had filled out and signed all the adoption paperwork agreeing to all the terms of the adoption agreement/contract as our daughter isn’t legally old enough to adopt a kitten. After all that we were denied the adoption because a few of our cats have been declawed in the front years ago even though we had signed the adoption agreement that we wouldn’t declaw the new kitten and understanding that if we breached the adoption agreement Cat Kids could take back the kitten at anytime. The volunteer flat out lied to our faces and said that she had been with the owner for 4 years and that the adoption agreement contained a statement about not declawing for the past 4 years and implied that we broke the contract when we had our cats declawed years ago when they were kittens. Just want to point out too that declawing a kitten/cat is not illegal. We went home with a daughter who had her heart broken for the second time in 2 days. See my daughter’s hamster died the day before and she wants a new pet that has a longer life expectancy as hamsters only live 1 - 3 years. When we got home we pulled out the adoption agreements that we signed when we adopted our other 2 cats from them and neither contract stated anything or contained a clause about not declawing. One contract didn’t have a revision and the other has a revision date of August 2020. The current adoption contract has a revision date of January 2023. So, as you can see the volunteer lied to us about the declawing clause being in affect for the past 4 years. We were denied because of something we did in the past. This rescue isn’t honest, will lie to your face, and like our society judges people based on past actions and doesn’t believe that people can change their stances, beliefs, or actions. This organization discriminates against people based on their past. This organization has no faith in people. This organization only cares about their own beliefs/agendas and not about finding good loving homes for their cats and kittens. So, to sum up this long review avoid this rescue at all costs if you ever did something in your life, no matter the circumstances or how long ago, that they may deem and/or view as something negative like declawing a cat or surrendering any pet. Save yourself the trouble and don’t adopt from this underhanded and biased “rescue”. There are plenty of good animal rescues in the world, this one however isn’t...

As a rescue I love cat kids and what they do. We’ve had experiences with their wonderful volunteers and sing their praises often because they are mostly such great people. However - we had one very negative experience with Phyllis, who runs the rescue, specifically. Very quick to decide whether you are a “good match” which is very frustrating for a family ready to love a pet.

After visiting the cats, meeting Phyllis who seemed to be really personable and kind to my face, and sharing my heart over a tragic experience out of our control with a past kitty that we were still grieving over, she recorded our names for the volunteers to see, so that we couldn’t adopt. We came back the next day after being told we could, completely unaware and thinking none the wiser, and found a kitten that our family fell in love with. We were prepared to go through with the process and then we were notified immediately that Phyllis had written my name (amongst A LOT of other names posted in the adoption room - some simply because they did not have a father figure with them?) in a spiral notebook so that we were essentially blacklisted, unable to adopt. After a few text exchanges to try and make things right or see what we could do, she shifted the blame and ghosted my message. We were completely out of luck.

Phyllis, honey, I’m pretty sure this is illegal. You are discriminating against good families who want to offer love to these animals looking for caring homes. Just be aware that if you are looking to adopt, you will more than likely be judged and falsely vetted if Phyllis is present and there’s something she doesn’t accept about you. Not everyone at the rescue is as callous or close minded so I will not speak for the rescue as a whole because we’ve had great experiences alternatively - since we stop to look at the cats periodically. But it was a sad day for our family with lots of tears (and lessons on discrimination) to feel absolute prejudice and unfairness on our behalf at the Largo Petsmart and cat kids rescue.

Understandably, our children don’t get the why, especially after finally being able to open up, bond and adopt again after an upsetting loss - so it was a punch to the gut. Not to mention embarrassing for all of us, to feel as if we weren’t good enough.

Rescues should welcome everyone regardless of whatever personal judgments they have. Unfortunately, Phyllis is going to prevent that from happening if she doesn’t like something about you or your lifestyle or even your other animals… whatever the situation may be and it is definitely not for the safety and well being of the animals. It’s simply a...

I recently moved to the state and, upon getting settled, I started a search for a kitten. I believe Pet Finder or a similar website led me to discover Cat Kids Rescue. Online, we saw a beautiful torti named "Bishara" and it said she was located at the Largo PetSmart. We went the next day and she wasn't. There were a lot of cats and we wanted to meet them. Unfortunately, we were there for 30 minutes and no one ever showed up to the adoption area (4-4:30PM). So I decided I'd call later.

I called the listed number for the rescue and mentioned "Bishara," the kitten my spouse and I had seen online and hoped to meet. The woman rushed me off the phone saying a foster has that cat and she will text me. You can see by the screenshots I shared how the texting began and she clearly did not send me a photo of "Bishara." She did not even respond after I sent the photo of the kitten! Two hours later I had to send her another text to get her to respond.

I text with the woman fostering the two calico kittens and did meet with her at the Largo PetSmart the next day. SHE was great, helpful, and very kind (Thank you, Kelly!!)! She mentioned that "no one knows" where "Bishara" is, who is fostering her or if she's even available. Her kittens were precious, but I declined in hopes they'd be adopted as a pair, as I could only adopt one.

So, a few days later, on the advice of foster mom Kelly, I text the owner again as I had been told they were getting some torti kittens soon. I had given up that I'd get any information about the original kitten I was interested in. As you can see from my screenshots (dates & timestamps are included), trying to converse with the owner is like pulling teeth.

In the end, I never got a response from the owner or more information about any kittens.

I fully believe any cats adopted through this rescue are done so purely by luck, getting a good foster's contact info, or being at the exact right local PetSmart at the perfect time to adopt via a foster/volunteer. If the owner is unable to handle speaking to people on the phone or via text, she should perhaps hire someone to take care of that aspect of business for her. I was trying REALLY hard to adopt through them and felt like I was burdening her by trying to ask about their available cats.

I guess the good thing I can say is, a couple days later, I went to the SPCA Tampa Bay instead. I ended up meeting the perfect kitten--never met such a sweetheart. I adopted her that day and have had her home for nearly two...