Julie donning her American Red Cross hat and HALTER Project shirt.
by Jill Feldon LaNouette
With decades of experience as a special event planner for luxury resorts, a serial entrepreneur and an overseer of a ranch and vineyard, you might expect Julie Atwood to spend her free time kicking back. But instead, on Saturday, April 18, Julie donned her American Red Cross hat and sneakers and walked with her fellow Red Crossers into multiple mobile homes to help “Sound the Alarm.”
A nationwide program, Sound the Alarm pairs Red Cross volunteers with community partners to install free smoke alarms and educate families about home fire safety and prevention. The Northern California Coastal Region designated April as the “signature period” where dozens of volunteers went door-to-door in at-risk communities in nine counties across the Greater Bay Area to provide information about how to prevent and respond to a fire or other natural disaster, as well as to install smoke alarms. Julie made sure that the families she met through Sound the Alarm were prepared to help all members of their households in a disaster – even the four-legged ones!
“I’ve had animals all of my life,” said Julie, referring to her horses, dogs, cats, goats and more. “And Sonoma County is resource rich in services. But it was very difficult to get information about what to do for my animals” in a disaster. Then, an emergency involving one of her ranch horses motivated her to develop local resources for helping animals in emergencies.
Julie with one of her horses.
In 2013, Julie founded the HALTER Project. Over the years, the HALTER Project has become an internationally recognized program dedicated to the safety and welfare of people and animals in emergencies and disasters. “There are increasing intersections between wildlife, people and their pets,” she added. “I saw a need where there was a gap and so I went to fill it.” The HALTER Project partners with the Red Cross to help ensure that animals are included in emergency planning and disaster relief operations.
A longtime Sonoma County resident and Red Cross board member, Julie has seen numerous disasters firsthand. She volunteered at major disasters such as the Tubbs Fire and the Oroville Dam spillway failure, both in 2017 in California. She deployed to the Dixie Fire in California in 2021 as a non-medical support volunteer with the University of California Davis veterinary emergency response team. During that almost eight-week deployment, she was assigned to assist at two Red Cross shelters, serving displaced Plumas County communities.
Throughout Julie’s experience as an animal disaster service volunteer, she frequently interacted with the Red Cross. At community outreach events, Julie got to know many of the local Red Cross staff and volunteers, which strengthened her determination to collaborate even more. She became a major donor, becoming a Tiffany Circle member in 2021. And in 2025, she was asked to join the North Bay Chapter of the Red Cross Board of Directors.
One of her first ideas was to collaborate on Sound the Alarm events.
“We saw Sound the Alarm through the Red Cross as a perfect partnership to get disaster and emergency preparedness education for pets and people into their hands,” she said. “The North Bay Red Cross team was great about it. Working together, we are hoping to create a model for Red Cross chapters across the country so that they can do the same wherever they are doing Sound the Alarm events in partnership with their local animal agencies and non-profit organizations. We’ve created a volunteer talking points cheat sheet and a special package of workbooks in English and Spanish.”
Julie believes that if people know how to take care of their pets in a disaster, they will also be more motivated to take care of themselves.
During April’s Sound the Alarm event at the Petaluma Estates Mobile Home Park, Julie shared information that will help resident Carol George know what to do to prepare her dog Penny for an emergency. The education will assist Donna Lewis in keeping her dog Winston safe should a fire break out. And when 15-year residents Beth and Jimmy Wehlage are cat-sitting, they will now have the knowledge that will enable them to manage Gundi and Chibi if a disaster strikes.
Julie (right) with Vincent Valenzuela (left) and Leland Montel (second to the right).
Thanks to Julie and more than 25 Red Crossers who installed free smoke alarms that day, these and other residents — as well as the volunteers — know what to do to reduce the risks to both their animals and themselves in an emergency. Julie plans to use her endless energy to ensure that people in other communities also benefit from the education, information and resources that the Red Cross and HALTER Project provide so they are ready should a disaster strike.
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