SAN ANTONIO — This time last year, K9s for Warriors pulled two dogs from San Antonio Animal Care Services. Those dogs were named Holly and Cliff, after KENS 5 journalist Holly Stouffer and photojournalist Cliff Goyang.
K9s for Warriors often names its dogs after people who had a hand in their rescue. Stouffer and Goyang were shooting a story with Eklof when they asked her to show them around the kennels.
During that tour, Ekloff connected with the two dogs that would later be named Holly and Cliff.
The dogs were sent to the main K9s for Warriors campus is Florida, where they went through several months of service-dog training.
Cliff was later sponsored and renamed Arthur. In August, he went home with his Warrior, Shirley.
“He has been paired with this forever more person, which we're very excited about,” Eklof said.
Eklof said Holly neared the end of her training, but didn’t graduate.
“When it came to public access training, there were just certain triggers for her, like loud noises,” Elkof said. “So we felt that it wasn't the best for her to be exposed to that type of setting on a daily basis.”
Instead, she went down a different path.
“Holly had a career change, but she has been adopted out to the family that was a perfect fit for her,” Eklof said.
She explained that K9s for Warriors has a network of potential adopters who are ready to take in dogs that don’t complete their program.
“Once we pull a dog from a shelter, they are part of our family,” Eklof said.
No matter the assignment, Eklof said every rescue dog’s story has a happy ending.
”They're both doing really, really good and we're super happy and proud of both of them,” Eklof said.
K9s For Warriors is the nation’s largest provider of trained Service Dogs to military veterans suffering from PTSD, traumatic brain injury and/or military sexual trauma. To learn more, click here.