Become A PBB Volunteer
This program is about training future working dogs, either service dogs for wounded war veterans or first responders, or therapy dogs for police departments, or explosive detection dogs for law enforcement. Please do not get involved in volunteering only to gauge whether your family is ready for a dog of its own. Our dogs are not pets.
To be eligible to volunteer for Puppies Behind Bars, you must be at least 18 years old and live in New York City—or within 45 minutes of one of our correctional facilities in New York to participate as a “puppy sitter.”
- Bedford Hills Correctional Facility
247 Harris Rd., Bedford Hills, NY 10507 - Eastern Correctional Facility
30 Institution Rd., Napanoch, NY 12458 - Fishkill Correctional Facility
18 Strack Dr., Beacon, NY 12508 - Green Haven Correctional Facility
594 NY-216, Stormville, NY 12582 - Otisville Correctional Facility
57 Sanitorium Ave, Otisville, NY 10963 - Wallkill Correctional Facility
50 McKendrick Rd., Wallkill, NY 12589
Volunteer Opportunities
Our volunteer opportunities are available 7 days a week.
- Overnight Sitters: taking dogs of all ages into your home overnight to socialize
- Daytime Sitters: taking dogs of all ages for a few hours to socialize
- Paws & Reflects: taking dogs to visit with a homebound elderly person for an hour a month (NYC residents only)
- Brood Fosters: we occasionally seek dedicated families to provide stable foster homes for our broods. Broods are essential to our program because they provide the puppies we train to become service dogs or explosive-detection canines. If you are interested in learning more about fostering one of our dogs, please call our office at 212.680.9562.
Volunteer Application
*Our online application is comprehensive, and includes a number of long-form answers. For this reason, we recommend you complete it on a desktop or laptop.
Thanks to all our prospective volunteers for your interest and willingness to participate. Please note the following considerations:
- We ask for a four-month commitment. It is important that our prospective volunteers understand that this is a serious commitment to a challenging and, at times, exhausting volunteer program. Your efforts help shape the future of a service or facility dog for wounded veterans, first responders and police departments, or explosive detection canines (EDCs) for law enforcement. Since training you and organizing your visits with each prison are quite involved, and the puppies benefit from consistency, we ask that you commit to volunteering once a month (overnight), or twice a month (daytime) for the next four months, consecutively. If you find you love it and have more time, we would be thrilled to have you volunteer more than once a month! However, in order to remain active in our system, you must maintain the minimum monthly commitment. We need to be strict with this guideline, so please take this into consideration before committing to the program.
- We require attendance at two consecutive three-hour training sessions. New York City volunteers train at our midtown office; all other New York State volunteers train in upstate locations. At the sessions, volunteers learn about handling the dogs, supplies needed, what commands the puppies know, how to read a dog’s body language, among other valuable tips.
- We strive to have a training session every four months.
Here are our upcoming dates (subject to change):- March 2 – 3, 2024 (Upstate)
- March 9 – 10, 2024 (NYC)
- June 1 – 2, 2024 (Upstate)
- June 8 – 9, 2024 (NYC)
- Volunteers must take a puppy out within 30 days of being trained, as a safety measure for volunteers and our dogs. Puppies must be taken out once per month (for overnight sitters) or twice a month (for day sitters) for four months consecutively, in order to remain an active volunteer.
Volunteering as a puppy sitter involves a big commitment and can be challenging, but it is also extremely rewarding!
