About Whiskers
Second chances for Utah’s highest-risk cats
Whiskers is a 100% volunteer-run, foster-based nonprofit serving senior cats, medical cases, and animals with special needs.
Our mission
Why Whiskers exists
Our mission is to minimize the euthanasia of high-risk pets in Utah.
We focus resources where patience, veterinary care, and a safe foster home can change the outcome for an animal others may pass over.
Priority 01
Rescue high-risk pets
Partner with Utah shelters to help senior cats, medical cases, and animals with special needs.
Priority 02
Keep pets in homes
Provide education and practical resources while promoting spay and neuter programs.
Priority 03
Make recovery possible
Fund veterinary care for animals who were not initially considered highly adoptable and give them time to heal.
Our story
One cat changed the trajectory
Founder Jessica Vigos began volunteering in animal shelters and caring for her first trap-neuter-return colony in 2012. The experience made the scale of unmet need among community and shelter cats impossible to ignore, and she spent the next five years deepening that work.
2017
Sweet Rick arrives
Jessica rescued Sweet Rick at about 16 years old. He was partially blind, partially deaf, severely underweight, and had been left outdoors after his caregiver died. Veterinary care and patient recovery gave them two years together, and Rick became the inspiration for the work ahead.
2018
Whiskers is founded
Jessica and friends founded Whiskers to concentrate on cats truly in need, including medical and special-needs cases and cats experiencing complications from declawing.
Today
Rescue rooted in real homes
Whiskers serves municipal-shelter animals across Davis, Weber, and Salt Lake counties, and helps in surrounding areas as resources allow. There is no brick-and-mortar facility; every rescued cat recovers in a foster home.
Annual impact
Accountable to cats and community
Whiskers publishes annual reports so supporters can see what their time, foster homes, and donations make possible.
850+High-risk cats’ lives changed through year-end 2024
100%Volunteer-run nonprofit rescue
3Primary Utah counties served
The Whiskers team
Volunteer leadership, shared purpose
Whiskers is sustained by people who foster, coordinate care, manage operations, tell the rescue’s story, and keep its systems working.
Jessica Vigos
Founder and Executive Director
Raised in a home where fostering and rescue were part of everyday life, Jessica founded Whiskers with friends in 2018 after years of shelter and TNR work. Her focus remains giving medically complex, senior, and special-needs cats the time and care to recover.
Julie Davis
Board President, Operations
A founding board member and longtime foster, Julie joined Jessica at Whiskers’ beginning and helps guide day-to-day operations.
Melody Gritton
Treasurer
Melody has worked in rescue since 2012 as a transporter and foster. As a CPA, she also supports Whiskers’ tax compliance.
Meka Hilton
Foster and Adoptions Coordinator
Meka supports foster families and helps each Whiskers cat find a home that fits, while continuing to volunteer and foster herself.
Erin McMullin
Community Engagement and Marketing Coordinator
Erin brings nonprofit and animal-welfare experience to fostering, fundraising, communications, photography, and social media.
Kenan Karalic
Web Administrator
Kenan has supported Whiskers’ web and technology needs since 2020 and also opens his home to animals who need fostering.
Interested in board service?
Whiskers reviews prospective board members during semiannual meetings in January and June.