Ted Pankiewicz Sr. still gets emotional talking about the community response after fire tore through his Fellsmere animal sanctuary in March.
"The fundraising was unbelievable," Pankiewicz said. "We couldn't believe the community had stepped forward and helped us raise about $100,000. We're going through building, putting up a new building."
Pankiewicz founded For the Love of Paws Senior Pet Sanctuary in 2014, a year after his daughter-in-law, Jess, died at 32 from complications of an autoimmune disease.
He and his son, Ted Pankiewicz Jr., built the organization around a simple idea: senior citizens moving into hospice care, nursing homes or assisted living often have nowhere to send a beloved pet.
"A lot of seniors who are going into any kind of facility, they outlive their family, friends and neighbors, and the only thing they outlive is their dog or their cat," Pankiewicz said.
The organization mainly takes in cats, but its intake list has included more unusual arrivals — 36 koi goldfish rescued from a senior's backyard pond, and parrots surrendered by owners who could no longer care for them.
"We're actually not a rescue. We're actually like a sanctuary," Pankiewicz said, meaning animals that come to the organization stay for life rather than being placed up for adoption.
Beyond the sanctuary, the nonprofit runs Paws Meals on Wheels, distributing more than 12,000 pounds of pet food every month to 18 locations, including area food pantries and homebound seniors who receive meals through the county's Meals on Wheels program.
"So 12 years ago, we started giving senior resources dog food and cat food, and that was the start of our Paws Meals on Wheels program," Pankiewicz said. "It just got bigger and bigger."
The program grew out of a pattern Pankiewicz said he noticed early on: many seniors were feeding their pets before feeding themselves. The organization now operates from a 2,000-square-foot warehouse on County Road 512 in Fellsmere.
For the Love of Paws also runs a therapy pet program, with 14 teams visiting hospitals, nursing homes and senior facilities around the county, and has donated more than 100 AI-powered robotic cats to memory care patients.
According to outside reporting, an electrical fire broke out at the sanctuary on March 9, 2026, destroying two cat cottages and killing 11 cats and a tortoise. Ted Pankiewicz Jr., the sanctuary's operations director, suffered second-degree burns on both arms pulling animals from the flames.
The community response that followed — nearly $100,000 in donations arriving within days — is funding a new, single steel structure designed with multiple exits, a sprinkler system and smoke detectors wired directly to the fire department, replacing the two wooden cottages that burned.
"We're going through building, putting up a new building," Pankiewicz said of the ongoing construction.