05/28/2026
Program pairs lonely Maine seniors with cats that need homes
Valerie Royzman • December 6, 2022
DEXTER — A new adoption program that aims to boost the well-being of seniors who live alone pairs them with cats in need of homes. Furever Friends, a project created by the Dexter Age Friendly Community, received a $5,000 grant from the Maine Community Foundation this summer and launched in October. The program has connected seven area seniors with cats and plans to make more matches.
The felines come from Spirits Place, a cat sanctuary that opened in 2016 and cares for feral and community cats on its 15-acre property in St. Albans.
The program is a unique response to the influx of animals in shelters across Maine, especially as temporary halts on evictions ended and house costs continue to soar,
Spirits Place founder Lee Palmer said. Some people can no longer afford to care for their pets and are forced to surrender them, she said. “Shelters around the state are at capacity,” she said. “People are put on hold or on a waitlist, they get frustrated and abandon their cats on the side of the road or dump them on farms or wherever. We see many sick, starving cats.”
The Furever Friends program, created to provide a companion to both the participating senior and a cat, serves several purposes. It’s meant to enhance the physical and mental health of the pair, as research suggests a cat’s purring calms people and may have
healing properties. The program also alleviates a concern that keeps some seniors from adopting — that the cat will be abandoned should the owner become unable to care for
them.
“They worry about leaving an animal behind,” said Liz Breault, Abbott Memorial Library director and head of the Dexter Age Friendly group. “It’s such a relief to know that
somebody will take care of their cat if anything happens to them.”
Spirits Place — home to about 200 cats that roam freely, including cats who are not adoptable due to health or socialization issues — also aims to educate the community about the bond between animals and humans, animal welfare and other related topics. It hosts a number of youth programs and collaborates with the library to offer affordable spay and neuter clinics several times a year.
Breault and Palmer have high hopes for the program because they’ve seen the joy that the cats and their new owners have brought each other, they said. Seniors have time to devote to the animals that tend to be more low-maintenance than dogs.
A 96-year-old man chose to adopt because he recently lost his pet and knew he would miss having a cat alongside him in the garden, Palmer said. Sometimes the seniors come in wanting a cat with certain qualities and leave with the total opposite, she said. “They pick each other,” she said. “We do have in mind a cat that would be a good fit, but we let it happen organically.”
Observer photo/Valerie Royzman
FUREVER FRIENDS — Joan Shapleigh, 85, at home with her new cat, Marmalade, in Dover-Foxcroft on Monday. She adopted the cat through the new Furever Friends program.
