ORCA'S primary goal is to rescue any ill, injured, or in-distress animal, in Lancaster County. We aim to rehabilitate these animals and find loving homes for them. We also provide information on animal-related problems through our Animal-Alert Hotline, 717-397-8922. It is the purpose of ORCA to respond 24 hours a day to animal emergencies, and to provide support to police, fire, and other emergency personnel when they are dealing with situations that involve animals. While we cannot rehabilitate wildlife, we do assist in capturing and transporting injured or sick wildlife to the closest certified wildlife rehabilitation center. In 2023, we responded to 550 emergency calls!

We do not handle healthy stray animals nor take in surrendered animals.

Our Story

In 1983 four people—Joyce Rupp, Penny Jordon, and John and Connie Kondravy had been involved either as volunteers or board members at the Lancaster County Humane League. As they learned more about the needs of Lancaster County people and animals, they realized that someone needed to provide at 24-hour service to aid the ill/injured/ trapped animals. When these people could find no organization to add this program to its mission, these four met and formed ORCA—Organization for Responsible Care of Animals. Each person put in $25 to start this charity! Our first injured animal, a dog, cost us $52; now we had $48 left! Quickly we learned to create fundraisers, recruit caring volunteers, and find donors. At first we were all volunteers, slowly we added paid part-time staff and then full-time staff. Today, we have experienced staff ready to respond 24 hours a day to an emergency. Our annual budget now runs from $120,000 to about $160,000. Hundreds of animals are helped annually.

To receive reports of injured animals, a 24-hour live hotline was created—the Aminal-Alert Hotline. The first week we received ten calls. Since then, we can easily receive double that number in a single day.