MEET OUR TEAM
Melissa Conrad
Founder/President
I founded Taffy's Legacy in 2015 when the previous rescue I had been involved with closed their doors. I had lost my soulmate dog Taffy in January of that year and it only seemed fitting to found a rescue in her name. My role, like most of the team member's roles, fluctuates depending on the needs of the rescue. That can be anything from dog intakes and evaluations, reference checks, picking up donations to overseeing adoptions.
I might be the definition of a crazy dog lady. I've had over 500 dogs come through my house in the last 14 years. When I am not volunteering with the rescue, almost all of my hobbies involve dogs. You can find me hanging out with my American Bulldogs whom I do various sports with and show in conformation. Alternatively, you may find me working in my dog boarding, training or daycare facility or tending to my training client's needs online at Training Dogs Online. I do have a handful of hobbies outside of the dog world and those include cooking, photography, camping and traveling. I also recently became a mom to a beautiful baby girl!
I dream of a day that dog rescues are not necessary. I became a dog trainer because I saw so many owners trying their best, but inevitably failing their dog and having to give them up because they did not have the resources to live a mutually beneficial life. The problems they were having all boiled down to training, so I started attending seminars and researching everything there was to know about training. My goal was to help people help their dogs, before they had to give them up. In an ideal world there will come a day that rescue will be essentially obsolete because we will have resources in place that promote responsible pet ownership.
Tyson Campbell
Fundraising Coordinator and Adoption Support
I first became aware of Taffy's after having brought my dogs to daycare at Delhi Dogs Paw. My husband and I had just adopted out first rescue (through another rescue) and we were having pretty severe problems between him, our other pup, and ourselves. Through online training we were able to solve a lot of our problems and it's something we continue to do on a regular basis. I first became involved with Taffy's specifically by doing reference checks and was lucky enough to become more involved in fundraising and adoption support when a spot on the core team opened up.
Least Favourite Behaviour?
Excessive barking.
Favourite Thing to Teach?
How to get over resource guarding.
Shannon Bokowski
Social Media Coordinator & Event Support
I've always been a huge animal lover but never had my own dog growing up. I always knew I would rescue when I could, but when I was finally in a place to adopt, I struggled to find an organization that would consider me because I had no prior experience and lived in an apartment. That's when I came across the idea of fostering which would allow me to "practice" being a dog owner short-term while being supported by a professional trainer, all the costs were covered and I'd get the bonus of helping save lives! Alas, my fostering career was cut short as I instantly fell in love with my first foster Blue. We adopted him after a month, but I always felt very connected to Taffy's and yearned to contribute to their organization again when I could.
I have a creative background, having participated in theatre my entire childhood, then studied film editing & copy writing/editing, and currently work in marketing. I'm thrilled to be a part of the team developing social media content and assisting with event coordination and look forward to connecting many more dogs to their forever families!
Fun Fact:
About 10 years ago, two guinea pigs were abandoned outside my husband's work. He brought them home with the intent that we'd bring them to the local humane society. Of course we kept them and have owned guinea pigs ever since.
Least favourite behaviour?
Barking & whining
Favourite thing to teach?
Building confidence & new tricks. It's so rewarding to see their growth!