Pamela Hoebeck loves to play with Peanut, a rescue cat, but she is hoping he’ll soon have someone to give him care and attention on a permanent basis.

Hoebeck, 60, has been fostering the year-old cat at her Penn Township home since he was found as a stray about four months ago in the Level Green area.

In keeping with his name, “he’s a tiny little thing, very sweet,” she noted. As with all cats and dogs taken in by the Pet Match Rescue organization Hoebeck founded, Peanut has been given a healthy dose of attention: He’s been neutered, vaccinated, checked by a veterinarian and fitted with a microchip. Now, he’s ready for adoption.

With any luck, Peanut’s story will end as happily as that of pit bull Buttercup, who had surgery to mend a hind leg that was shattered when the dog was abused at a party. The dog has since been adopted by Hoebeck’s sister, Paula Lawrence of Harrison City, who helped start the animal rescue and is among about a dozen volunteers in the Pittsburgh region who provide foster care for the nonprofit organization.

“I cry constantly over these animals when we see where they’re coming from,” Hoebeck said. “So many times I’ve said, ‘I can’t do this anymore. It’s too heartbreaking.’ And then, out of the blue, I get pictures of one of our animals that was in a really bad situation that’s now in a wonderful home.

“It’s just very rewarding when we see them thrive.”

Lifelong animal lovers, Hoebeck and her sister brought home and cared for all kinds of pets when they were growing up in New Kensington.

“We would rescue birds, anything that we could that was injured or running around as a stray,” Hoebeck said.

At 16, she began volunteering for a local animal rescue organization. Years later, when she and her sister both moved to the Penn Township area, she decided to form her own group, Pet Match.

There’s little that stands in Hoebeck’s way when she learns of dogs or cats that are in need of care and a loving home. Though she’s allergic to cats, she takes shots to alleviate the condition and has nine felines housed in her converted garage. She, her sister and other volunteers have fostered 60 or more cats at a given time.

Though many of Hoebeck’s rescue operations occur in the area, she has traveled by car or plane to bring back animals in need from as far away as South Carolina and California. She’s also arranged international pet rescues from Peru and Korea, and brought some dogs back from the Bahamas on a chartered plane. Two of them, shepherd mix Eden, who was expecting a litter, and her daughter, Nugget, have become part of Hoebeck’s own six-dog pack.

“My feeling is there are no boundaries when it comes to an animal in need,” Hoebeck said.

When Hoebeck rescued 60 dogs and cats from Mississippi, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, she was assisted by fellow animal lover Christine Bottegal Farrell of Leechburg. Farrell, who serves on the board of the Kiski Valley Cat and Kitten Rescue, has since become one of Pet Match’s foster volunteers and a companion on many of Hoebeck’s cross-country rescues.

“We’ve gone to Southern California and to Myrtle Beach. We go anywhere,” Farrell said. “When we’re out on the road, we stay cheap, bring the animals in our rooms in crates and bring them back.”

Their efforts gained national recognition a few years ago through the “World Dog Awards,” hosted by comedian George Lopez on The CW television network. The pair traveled to a California studio with Red, a stray Basenji who was a finalist for the show’s Rescue Dog of the Year award — after they’d retrieved him from Georgia, with the help of an organization that flew the dog to Arnold Palmer Regional Airport in Unity.

Red didn’t win the title but received the best reward of all, a new home with adoptive owners in Monroeville.

“It was an amazing experience, a really great honor,” Hoebeck said of the TV exposure.

Through her friendship with Hoebeck, Farrell has learned, “with everything she does, in the back of her mind are the animals, and how to rescue them.”

Even with discounts from area practices, Hoebeck said meeting veterinary costs for rescued animals is a major challenge for her organization, averaging about $500 per dog or cat. Pet Match also provides more advanced medical care and dog obedience training, as needed, for its animals — some of which are in permanent foster care because of health issues.

“My philosophy is that each animal that comes into our rescue deserves whatever they need,” Hoebeck said. “When you’re in our rescue, you’re part of our family. If (rescued animals) don’t get a permanent home, they’re permanent with us.”

At age 44, Hoebeck obtained a degree in business and marketing from Duquesne University, helping her to advance in her career as a sales manager for Procter & Gamble and to earn more money for supporting animal rescues. When her sales territory was eliminated, she switched to selling real estate at the pet-friendly Murrysville office of Coldwell Banker.

For each property transaction she closes, she donates between $250 and $500 either to Pet Match or to a similar rescue group that has networked with her. As a bonus, some of her real estate clients have become pet adopters. A donation is required from adopters to help cover expenses.

Hoebeck noted her rescue operations wouldn’t be possible without community partners like The Dog Stop, a canine day care, boarding and grooming business in Monroeville that assists with foster care and fundraising efforts. She also praised the volunteers who foster animals or help with other tasks like maintaining Pet Match’s website and social media presence.

“It takes a village to save one dog or one cat,” she said.

While Pet Match can’t accommodate the same numbers of animals as other rescue groups with shelters, Hoebeck said her organization’s reliance on in-home foster care has benefits for the animals and for their eventual new owners.

“We like to put dogs in foster homes because the fosters housebreak them, train them and get them to interact with people, cats and other dogs,” she said.

Pet Match has 15 dogs on hand in foster care — including Max, a Golden Retriever mix, and Charlie, a Chesapeake Bay Retriever mix.

Hoebeck is looking for additional volunteers to foster pets or help with grant-writing. “The more fosters we have, the more dogs and cats we can bring in,” she said.

Visit petmatchrescuepa.org to learn more about the nonprofit and the pets available for adoption.

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