The woman who set up St John Outreach Therapy Pets in Wanaka is one of 69 people to be named in the 2020 Order of St John Honour List.

Janine Taylor said she was “really surprised” to see her name on the list, but was happy to accept the award if it helped raise the profile of the therapy pets programme.

Outreach Therapy Pets is a community service programme delivered by St John in which volunteers share their animal companions with those who live in rest homes, hospitals, rehabilitation units, healthcare facilities and schools throughout New Zealand, helping enhance those people’s lives.

“It’s a really rewarding thing just to share our dogs around the place,” Janine said. “They have so much love to give people.”

Janine first came across the programme when she was on the SPCA committee, organising the Mutley Dog Show (“a kind of ‘anti-Crufts’ dog show”).

She became the team leader for the therapy pets programme when she lived in Kerikeri, a role she held for seven years, and said she was “horrified” to find the programme wasn’t established here when she moved to Wanaka.

It took about a year for Janine to go through the bureaucratic process to set up the programme in Wanaka, and it was finally ready to go in 2015.

“We go into the local primary schools and children practice reading to the dogs,” she said. “The dogs thrive on the attention they get. They can lie next to a child who is patting them while they read.”

The programme also runs in the local library, and some members go to rest homes and visit the elderly with their dogs. The group is also getting involved with Alzheimers and Age Concern, Janine said.

“Dogs are wonderful icebreakers. Particularly with the elderly, they are amazing... When we take the dogs along they come out of their shells, and start reminiscing about the dogs they used to own.”

There are now 23 people - and 23 dogs - involved in the programme in Wanaka.

Dogs are assessed to take part, and they have to be gentle, calm, and affectionate, Janine said.

“It’s all about the dog’s personality, how they respond to their owner, and people. We’ve had dogs as small as a chihuahua, right up to a labradoodle.”

Janine is now working almost full-time as an administrator for St John in Wanaka. She also volunteers as the therapy pets team leader but is not currently visiting with dogs, as her dog Sharna - who was a therapy pet - has now resigned, and her second dog Bonzo is “a completely bonkers labradoodle” who is too boisterous to be a therapy pet.

Janine is now a 'Member of St John'. She attended an Investiture Ceremony at the ‘Transitional Cathedral’ in Christchurch, where governor-general Dame Patsy Reddy awarded her with her medal. 

PHOTO: Wanaka App