A Kennewick nonprofit that uses therapeutic riding and other equine-assisted activities to help children and adults with special needs and trauma is asking for the community’s help to continue operating.

Therapeutic Riding of Tri-Cities, or TROT, is seeking $40,000 to help it through the winter months, said Cynthia MacFarlan, founder and director.

“We educate, we empower and we really get people engaged in a way that animals and only animals can,” she said. “We want people in the community to know that we’re here, to come and visit us and participate in any of the programs they find appropriate, and to rally around TROT. We’ve built a solid foundation, and we have an awesome board of directors and great staff, and now we really just are needing to sustain what was built.”

TROT has established a monthly donor program, with a goal of 200 monthly donors contributing what they see fit. They also have an Adopt a Horse program, plus one-time donation and planned giving opportunities.

Financial challenges

In a letter on Sept. 23, Maria Castillo, president of the TROT board, made an appeal to supporters outlining the group’s financial challenges.

The letter asks for $15,000 through year’s end, although MacFarlan said later that the financial picture has changed and $40,000 is needed to get the TROT through February, when programming picks back up after the winter.

The organization needs about $168,000 a year to operate, and it relies on program and tuition revenue, grants, fundraising events and donations.

It has trimmed expenses, board members have made personal contributions and MacFarlan is foregoing a salary for the next few months, the letter said. TROT also is “optimistically awaiting grants,” it says.

Greater expenses

Still, the organization has expanded its offerings in recent years and is serving more people, and that comes with greater expenses, MacFarlan said.

TROT got its start in Pasco a decade ago, using only volunteers. It moved to a larger property in Kennewick in fall 2020 and now has two full-time staff members and a few others working part time, with the equivalent of 3.5 full-time staff members in all. It also has scores of volunteers.

The organization helps people ages 4 and older through several programs, including adaptive riding, hippotherapy, a horsemanship class and a Trotters Club for young volunteers. It also has a Horses Helping Heroes program for veterans, first responders, law enforcement officers and health care workers.

The nonprofit Therapeutic Riding of Tri-Cities, or TROT, which provides therapeutic riding and other equine-assisted activities, is in need of financial help from the community to continue operating. 

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Courtesy of Therapeutic Riding of Tri-Cities (TROT)

How it helps

So far this year, it’s helped more than 290 people.

It has nine horses, plus chickens, goats and cats on the property.

TROT makes a tangible difference, MacFarlan said.

She has story after story of participants whose lives have been improved by TROT programs, including a young boy from Ukraine with cerebral palsy who was able to experience physical freedom in a way he hadn’t before while riding a horse. One of his first English words was “horse,” MacFarlan said.

Mikaela Hellfeldt of Richland said TROT has helped her daughter Rylee, 7, with language skills and confidence.

Rylee was diagnosed with autism, and “we were looking for something to get her into to help her, to socialize her,” Hellfeldt said on a recent afternoon at TROT, while Rylee took part in an adaptive riding class. “We heard that being in contact with things like horses and being able to feel that motion of the horse helps move things along in the brain and helps grow different skills,” Hellfeldt said, and “we have seen a difference.”

When Rylee rides, “you can tell she feels much better,” her mom said.

How to help

MacFarlan said she’s optimistic about the future of TROT, noting that the response to the appeal letter has been encouraging. 

She hopes the community continues stepping up.

“I’m just fighting tooth and nail to keep it sustained because it’s so important to this community to have something like this,” she said.

For more about TROT or to make a donation, go to: trot3cities.org/beginnings.