Every pet family deserves access to trusted care, expert support, and a safe place to turn during life’s challenges. The Liberty Center is being created to meet those needs through boarding, daycare, veterinary behavioral services, crisis support, and disaster response resources, all in one purpose-built destination. Construction is expected to begin in late 2026, creating a community resource that will serve pet families throughout the Bay Area for generations to come.
What is The Liberty Center?
Explore the vision for a first-of-its-kind destination for pet care, behavioral services, and family support.
Supporting The Liberty Center Campaign
Help create a lasting resource that will serve pets and families for generations.
Learn More About The Liberty Center
Dive deeper into the project, the plans, and the people helping make it possible.
“The Liberty Center is about freedom. The freedom to know your pet is safe, loved, and receiving exceptional care when you need to be elsewhere.”
– Susan Lee Vick, Joybound President & Chief Executive Officer
What is The Liberty Center?
The Bay Area’s pet population continues to grow, while demand for trusted boarding, daycare, and behavioral resources increasingly exceeds available options. The Liberty Center will help address that gap while reducing pet surrender, supporting successful pet-family relationships, and providing a safety net during times of crisis.
“The bond between people and their pets should never be jeopardized by a behavioral challenge, family emergency, or unexpected life event. The Liberty Center will provide families with peace of mind, expert support, and professional care, all in one destination designed to help pets stay healthy, happy, and with the people who love them.”
– Dr. Wailani Sung, Joybound People & Pets Senior Director of Animal Admissions and Wellbeing
Building a Future Where Pets and People Stay Together
The Liberty Center is a place designed around the needs of today’s pet families. This exciting new project will bring together services that are rarely found under one roof:
- Exceptional Boarding & Daycare: Modern dog and cat accommodations, enriching play spaces, and professional animal care designed around wellbeing and safety.
- Veterinary Behavioral Medicine: Specialized assessment and treatment led by veterinary behaviorist Dr. Wailani Sung to help pets and families overcome behavioral challenges and stay together.
- Crisis & Disaster Support: Safe, temporary care for pets when families experience hospitalization, housing instability, domestic violence, natural disasters, or other emergencies.
- A Sustainable Impact Model: Revenue generated through boarding and daycare helps support programs that keep pets and people together while strengthening long-term community impact.
The Liberty Center will bring together dedicated boarding for dogs, cats, and small companion animals, along with training spaces, exercise yards, behavioral services, and crisis boarding support. Thoughtfully designed around the needs of pets and families, the facility will provide exceptional care while helping keep people and their beloved companions together during both everyday life and times of need.
See the Project Take Shape
An Ambitious Vision from Dr. Wailani Sung
What if families with behaviorally complex pets had a trusted place to turn for specialized care, humane training, and safe boarding? In the video testimonial below, Dr. Wailani Sung, a board-certified veterinary behaviorist and Joybound’s Senior Director of Animal Admissions and Wellbeing, shares the vision behind The Liberty Center and explains how behavioral medicine, positive-reinforcement training, thoughtful boarding, and community support can come together under one roof.
Being Part of Joybound’s Future
The Liberty Center is more than a building. It’s a commitment to ensuring that pets and the people who love them have access to support when they need it most. Whether through a one-time gift, multi-year pledge, donor-advised fund recommendation, stock donation, IRA gift, or naming opportunity, your investment helps bring this vision to life.
“The Liberty Center represents one of the most meaningful investments our community can make, not just in a building but in the future of people and the pets they love.”
– Lisa Moore, Joybound People & Pets Chief Advancement Officer
Want to get involved? Please feel free to contact Lisa Moore, Joybound’s Chief Advancement Officer, at [email protected]. Every gift brings The Liberty Center closer to opening its doors and serving pet families across the Bay Area. Whether funding construction, veterinary behavioral services, crisis boarding spaces, or enrichment programs, donors are helping create a lasting resource that will improve lives for decades to come.
The Case for Support
For more information about The Liberty Center and how your support can make this exciting project possible, explore the complete Case for Support, including project plans, impact projections, naming opportunities, and the long-term vision for The Liberty Center.
Creating Your Legacy Within The Liberty Center
The Liberty Center itself is named in honor of Liberty, a rescued greyhound whose life reflected the love, security, and freedom every pet deserves. Her legacy will live on through a place dedicated to helping pets feel safe, families find peace of mind, and the human-animal bond remain strong through everyday needs and life’s most challenging moments.
Donors can create legacies of their own through meaningful naming opportunities throughout the building. From the Veterinary Behavior Clinic and boarding accommodations to play yards, consultation rooms, and other purpose-built spaces, these opportunities offer a lasting way to honor a loved one, celebrate a beloved pet, or demonstrate a commitment to the future of pets and their families.
Learn More
For more information about The Liberty Center and how your support can make this exciting project possible, explore the FAQ section below. Interested in speaking to someone about this exciting new project? Please feel free to contact Lisa Moore, Joybound’s Chief Advancement Officer, at [email protected].
“The Liberty Center is about creating new community resources for pet families, providing expert support when challenges arise, and strengthening the bond between people and pets. The Liberty Center is an investment in peace of mind and a more joyful future for our community.”
– Susan Lee Vick, Joybound People & Pets President & Chief Executive Officer
Liberty Center FAQs
What is The Liberty Center?
The Liberty Center is a new Joybound People & Pets facility planned as a community-centered destination for pet boarding, daycare, veterinary behavioral services, crisis boarding, and disaster response. It is designed to meet every day pet-care needs while expanding specialized support for pets and families during difficult circumstances.
The Liberty Center is a place where exceptional everyday pet care helps power extraordinary community support. It will provide trusted boarding and daycare for dogs, cats, and critters, expert veterinary behavioral training services, and a safe option for pets when families face personal crises or community-wide natural disasters.
Why is Joybound building The Liberty Center?
Demand for trusted, high-quality pet care and behavioral services in the Bay Area has been growing for at least two decades. The Liberty Center aims to fill that gap while advancing Joybound’s mission of keeping pets and people healthy, happy, safe, and together.
How does The Liberty Center support Joybound’s mission?
The Liberty Center connects revenue-generating services with mission-driven support. Families who use boarding, daycare, and related services will receive professional care for their own pets, while earned revenue will strengthen programs, including crisis care for pet families facing hardship.
The model is designed so that everyday services can help expand resources for other pets and people in the community.
Who will be able to use The Liberty Center?
The Liberty Center is being designed to serve pet families seeking everyday boarding, daycare, behavioral, training, and consultation services, as well as families and pets needing crisis or disaster-related support. Detailed service areas, intake processes, reservations, eligibility standards, and pricing have not yet been determined.
Where does The Liberty Center’s name come from?
The Liberty Center is named in honor of Liberty, the beloved dog of the Center’s naming donors. Liberty embodied the joy, comfort, and unconditional love pets bring to our lives, as well as the care, security, and freedom every pet deserves. Is The Liberty Center simply a boarding and daycare business?
Is The Liberty Center just a pet boarding facility?
While boarding and daycare are central services, The Liberty Center is designed to do much more. Plans also include veterinary behavioral services, dedicated behavioral boarding, training and consultation spaces, crisis boarding, and disaster-response capabilities. Its earned-income model will help support Joybound’s mission-driven programs in the broader community as a nonprofit leader in Contra Costa County
What spaces and features will be included at The Liberty Center?
Spaces and features at The Liberty Center will include:
- Modern dog and cat boarding suites.
- Enriched daycare play yards with structured programming.
- A dedicated veterinary behavior clinic and training facility.
- Dedicated training and consultation rooms.
- Dedicated behavioral boarding areas for dogs whose needs may not be met in traditional boarding environments.
- Crisis boarding accommodations and support services when needed.
- Advanced safety, enrichment, and animal-wellness programs.
- Capacity to provide temporary care for pets affected by wildfires, floods, and other emergencies.
What will The Liberty Center’s veterinary behavioral clinic do?
The veterinary behavioral clinic at The Liberty Center will provide specialized diagnostics, treatment, and behavioral support for pets with behavioral challenges. Expanded access to behavioral care will help address underlying issues, strengthen adoption outcomes, and support families in keeping their pets.
The clinic will be led by Dr. Wailani Sung, Joybound’s Senior Director of Animal Admissions and Wellbeing. Dr. Sung is a board-certified veterinary behaviorist and holds a PhD in psychology with a focus on animal behavior.
What is crisis boarding?
Crisis boarding is short-term, safe care for pets whose guardians are navigating hardships such as medical emergencies or hospitalization, housing instability, domestic violence, residential treatment, or other unforeseen circumstances. Its purpose is to help families seek safety or care without having to surrender their pets.
How will The Liberty Center support disaster response?
The Liberty Center is intended to expand Joybound’s disaster-response capacity by providing temporary care for pets affected by wildfires, floods, and other community emergencies.
How will The Liberty Center be funded?
The Liberty Center is funded through a blended model: philanthropic support will help fund construction, and Joybound will self-fund a portion of the construction expenses from Joybound’s investment account. Revenue from the facility will repay the investment account over a period of time.
Will every service at The Liberty Center be free?
No. The Liberty Center will include fee-based boarding, daycare, and related services.
Are naming opportunities at The Liberty Center available?
Yes. Dedication and naming opportunities are available throughout The Liberty Center. Specific opportunities, gift levels, availability, and recognition terms should be discussed with Joybound’s Philanthropy team.
What approvals for The Liberty Center project has Joybound received?
The Walnut Creek Planning Commission unanimously approved The Liberty Center project at its September 10, 2026, meeting. Joybound announced the approval on September 16, 2026, stating that it cleared the way to advance plans for construction.
When will construction begin and when will The Liberty Center open?
The Liberty Center’s groundbreaking is scheduled for December 2026 with an expected facility opening in early 2028.
Joybound announced that Overaa Construction is the general contractor partnering with the organization to bring The Liberty Center from vision to reality.
General Joybound FAQs
Where is Joybound located?
Joybound’s national headquarters and primary adoption center are located at 2890 Mitchell Drive, in Walnut Creek, California.
The Joybound Thrift Store, Cat Lounge & Adoption Center is located at 1950 Market Street, Suite I, in Concord, California.
What kind of shelter or rescue is Joybound?
Joybound People & Pets (formerly the Animal Rescue Foundation) is a 501(c)(3) registered non-profit organization founded in 1991 to rescue dogs and cats from overcrowded municipal shelters and strengthen the human-animal bond for children, seniors, Veterans, and people in need. Read about our unique dual mission and origin story.
Our team is committed to finding homes for all healthy and treatable dogs and cats in our care. Animals with treatable medical or behavioral conditions are evaluated and cared for prior to rehoming them. Learn more about these classifications by reviewing Maddie’s Fund’s Health & Behavior Categories for Shelter Animals. Potential adopters are provided with all health and behavior history during their time at Joybound.
Can I surrender an animal to Joybound?
We rescue dogs and cats from overcrowded or under-resourced municipal shelters. We do not accept surrenders from the public. If you feel unable to continue caring for your pet, please contact our Resource Center or read about rehoming a pet.
If you adopted from Joybound, our team is here to support you through the difficult decision to return your companion. Please read our adoption return policy.
How is Joybound funded?
We are a non-profit organization funded by private donations from individuals, foundations, and corporations. Our complete financial information is available here. Joybound is a registered charity in all 50 states.
Does Joybound offer programs for children?
From birthday parties to animal-themed camps, we have a wide variety of programs to help nurture the next generation of animal-lovers.
Does Joybound offer advice on caring for a pet?
The Pet Care and Behavior Library is filled with helpful information on pet care, solutions for common behavior challenges, training tips, and more.
If you do not see a certain topic covered, please contact the Resource Center for guidance.
Does Joybound offer veterinary services?
Animals in our adoption program are given veterinary care at our state-of-the-art clinic, but we do not provide primary veterinary services to the public.
Limited services are available for low-cost spay and neuter, dental cleaning services, end-of-life services, veterinary assistance programs for low-income pet guardians, and wellness veterinary care for Veterans’ pets. Explore veterinary assistance options.
Will Joybound help fund my organization or project?
We are a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, relying solely upon donations to fund our programs. We are not a granting organization and do not accept solicitations for funding.
Donation FAQs
How can I make a donation?
It’s easy to make a secure online donation.
To donate by mail, please send checks to Joybound People & Pets, 2890 Mitchell Dr., Walnut Creek, CA, 94598.
How will my donation be spent?
We know you have many choices when it comes to charitable gifts. We are a proud recipient of Candid’s Platinum Seal of Transparency.
