{"id":243132,"date":"2026-04-10T05:16:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T05:16:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/243132\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T05:16:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T05:16:11","slug":"k9s-for-warriors-el-paso-animal-services-partner-for-veterans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/243132\/","title":{"rendered":"K9s for Warriors, El Paso Animal Services partner for veterans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"462\" height=\"261\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"rounded-lg\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/700df8910820206d1e041f2b9b4e09b7.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>K9s for Warriors, El Paso Animal Services partner for veterans<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">EL PASO, Texas (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ktsm.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:KTSM;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;KTSM&quot;}\" class=\"link \">KTSM<\/a>) \u2014 K9s for Warriors partnered with the El Paso Animal Services Department to find and test dogs that can potentially become emotional support animals for veterans at the Westside Adoption Center, located at 5625 Confetti Drive.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">K9s for Warriors is a veteran-owned, non-profit organization that test and train shelter dogs to become an aid for military veterans that are suffering from PTSD, traumatic brain injuries or military sexual trauma.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Daniel Clavel, director of procurement and placement for K9s for Veterans, talked to KTSM crews about the program.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cFor 15 years, we\u2019ve been rescuing dogs, rescuing veterans,\u201d Clavel said. \u201cWe\u2019re saving two lives at the end of the leash.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">K9s for Warriors stated that they train the dogs to help acclimate veterans back into civilian life after serving our country, successfully pairing over 1,200 \u201cwarriors\u201d through the program.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cWe pair veterans every month with service dogs to help with the invisible wounds of war,\u201d Clavel said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Besides K9s for Warrior\u2019s goal to find qualifying dogs for veterans, officials introduced a new first-time project called \u201cOperation Save Every Warrior.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Operation Save Every Warrior is a course that will help four veterans and their service dogs graduate from a first satallite class, giving the organization an opportunity to reach veterans that can\u2019t attend their classes based in Florida or San Antonio.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Jose Cortez, community programs manager at El Paso Animal Services, said they are hoping for about 10 to 15 or more dogs to qualify for K9s for Warriors training.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cIt is imperative for veterans that need service animals to have them. This can help with PTSD episodes, anxiety attacks, companionship,\u201d Cortez said. \u201cHaving a qualified service dog to be there and help you in times of need, helps get through hard times of recovering from traumatic events.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Cortez is a veteran and served 22 years in the Air Force.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">He says working with Animal Services was his way to help and he is excited to work with K9s for Veterans.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cNot everybody in the civilian population understands what you are as a veteran,\u201d Cortez told KTSM. \u201cIt\u2019s almost funny that a canine almost understands you more than a person sometimes.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ktsm.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTSM 9 News.;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTSM 9 News.&quot;}\" class=\"link \"> For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTSM 9 News. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"K9s for Warriors, El Paso Animal Services partner for veterans EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) \u2014 K9s for Warriors&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243133,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[92958,138,17160,140,139,92955,92960,92954,498,19735,1011,92957,92959,89517,92956],"class_list":{"0":"post-243132","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-el-paso","8":"tag-daniel-clavel","9":"tag-el-paso","10":"tag-el-paso-animal-services","11":"tag-el-paso-headlines","12":"tag-el-paso-news","13":"tag-emotional-support-animals","14":"tag-jose-cortez","15":"tag-k9s-for-warriors","16":"tag-ktsm","17":"tag-military-veterans","18":"tag-non-profit-organization","19":"tag-service-dogs","20":"tag-the-el-paso-animal-services-department","21":"tag-traumatic-brain-injuries","22":"tag-westside-adoption-center"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243132\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}