$50K Pepsi grant helps with beneficial service dog program

    Life took a hard turn after two incidents disabled two members of the Brady family. Their saving grace turned out to be of the four-legged variety.

Photo by Emily Dougherty

Barbara Brady, Ricky McNair and McNair’s service dog, Tori, stand in front of the new GAP Service Dogs van, which will help the non-profit’s disabled clients get to and from trainings with their dogs.

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After a collapsed lung left Caitlin Brady paralyzed, the then-7-year-old from Keenesburg decided to turn the family’s Great Pyrenees into a service dog. The Brady family is now dedicated to the Denver non-profit GAP Service Dogs that helped them make the best of some tough times. To show their gratitude, the Brady family entered the organization into the Pepsi Refresh Project and helped win the “underdogs” a $50,000 grant.

    In June 2005, Barbara Brady was at a Keenesburg parade when the family’s spooked horse kicked her in the head, twice. The aftereffects of the accident left Brady with a non-functioning frontal left lobe, a metal plate in her head and serious episodes of vertigo. She wasn’t expected to walk or talk right again.
    While Brady was still going through her recovery, her 7-year-old daughter Caitlin, who suffers from asthma, fell into a four-day coma after her lung inexplicably collapsed. When she woke, her left leg was paralyzed.
    As Brady and Caitlin worked through physical therapy, Brady watched as her daughter fought to get around places that weren’t wheelchair-friendly. She also observed Caitlin’s peers begin to avoid her out of fear.
    That was all before Caitlin, now 13, decided to turn their 95-pound Great Pyrenees, Badger, into a service dog through the help of GAP (Guild Assistance Partners) Service Dogs – a nonprofit that works with owners to train their dogs as service dogs and places trained dogs with people living with disabilities.
    Now the Brady family has three service dogs. Brady has Jasper, and Caitlin has Badger and a chocolate lab puppy named Talia who is training to be a therapy dog at Caitlin’s school.
    At the request of her daughter, Brady began looking for ways to find GAP some extra funding.
    “Truly. Caitlin said to me one day, ‘Mom, GAP does such wonderful things. You really need to get them some money.’ And that was the start,” Brady said. “If people knew about them, they would want to help. In 10 years, they’ve placed more than 300 service dogs successfully.”
    When she heard about the Pepsi Refresh Project (www.refresheverything.com), it seemed to be the perfect chance to get GAP a much-needed grant. The Pepsi Refresh Project gives away millions of dollars each month to fund “refreshing ideas that change the world.”
    The initiative started in 2009 and funds projects that make a difference in six categories: education, neighborhoods, the planet, food and shelter, arts and culture, and health.
    Ideas are categorized under $5,000, $25,000, $50,000 and $250,000. Final winners are based on the number of votes each project receives. The top 10 in each category win.
    Brady entered GAP Service Dogs in the $50,000 category. Her goal was to help the organization win funds that could be used to purchase a new van and power wheelchair lift that could transport clients and their service dogs to training opportunities.
    To win Brady, volunteers and other GAP clients went to college campuses, stood at bus stations and light-rail stops and camped out at Black Friday to pass out business cards containing the contest and voting information.
    “On Black Friday, when we started we were in eighth place and by the end we were in fourth place,” Brady said.
    Voting for their grant took place throughout the month of November. The GAP team came out with a narrow win in 10th place. By Jan. 24, the full $50,000 was available.
    After a lot of research, Brady purchased a 2011 Mercedes Sprinter van from a dealership in Westminster. She souped it up with a wheelchair lift and restraints for up to four power chairs. The van has a popped top which lets someone as tall as 6 feet 4 inches stand up inside. In addition to the space for power-chairs, the van can seat four passengers who don’t need chairs.
    A lot of GAP trainings are outings, which means the van is necessary for transporting people to and from class.
    To celebrate the organization’s win, Brady and Caitlin handed the van’s keys over to GAP trainers at Brighton’s Buffalo Wild Wings Saturday.
    Anyone was able bring in the online ticket and 20 percent of all of the B’Dubs food sold from 10 a.m. to noon went toward GAP Service Dogs.
    The funds helped raise money for the organization’s next group of service dogs in training.
    “It’s not just about giving people a service dog. It’s so much bigger than that. These people come and they learn how to ride the bus with their dog. They learn how to go grocery shopping with their dog. It gives you freedom,” Brady said.
    According to Brady, a lot of people who use GAP’s services probably wouldn’t go out if they didn’t have their dog. Some of the clients have nurses who get them in and out of bed every day. During the in-between time, their dogs help them with everything from getting dressed to opening doors to picking up things they drop.
    “It is the difference between people being able to live in their own apartment and having to live in a care facility,” Brady said.
    In her experience, that was the case. With Caitlin, who can now walk short distances and use a forearm crutch at school, a service dog helped her reconnect with peers who were intimidated by her disability.
    “We’ve done such a good job not staring at [disabled] people that now we don’t even see them. I believe [service dogs] give them the courage to go out and about,” Brady said. “The relationship with dogs is wonderful in itself. The relationship with a service dog is something completely different. In their mind, they get that you need their help. I don’t know how they know, but they do.”
    She added that it was unusual for a full-grown dog like Badger to be able to transition into the life of a service dog so quickly because service dogs typically start training as puppies.
    “I would say it was nothing short of a miracle,” Brady said. “Badger wasn’t exposed to things right off the get-go. That does make it more difficult. Part of it had to have been that Badger, in some way, decided she would do this.”
    The cost of a service dog is in the thousands, and a waiting list could be up to five years long.
    Brady said GAP provides service dogs and their training at no cost. A $25 application fee is the only expense.
    “I used to tell my kids, ‘You can change the world.’ Then I got hurt, and it’s been a long six years,” Brady said. “I’m hoping this will get them back in the mode of ‘we can make a difference.’”
    Visit gapservicedogs.com.