There are no childhood photos of Melissa without a cat or dog wrapped tightly in her arms, and barely any adult photos without the same theme. Melissa is a lifelong animal lover, a proud foster parent and passionate advocate and fundraiser for animal welfare initiatives.

Melissa started her career at the Hamilton/Burlington SPCA in fundraising where she eventually became the Manager of Outreach and Development. She spent a collective eight years there, improving and building processes to lower expenses and maximize fundraising efforts.

In 2019, she started her own digital marketing collective, FLUX Media. FLUX is home to a number of animal welfare non-profit clients across Ontario and Melissa brings her non-profit heart and agency brain to each and every project. She has recently worked on a National-level puppy mill awareness campaign with Humane Canada and works very closely with the Ontario Shelter Medicine Association to further their mission in promoting networking and educational opportunities to shelter medicine professionals in Ontario, as well as working towards a national shelter medicine organization for the country.

Melissa has planned and executed two spay/neuter campaigns with Natalia Hanson through their organization, Humane Outreach for Latin Animals (HOLA), which has collectively resulted in over $15,000 raised and over 500 animals spayed/neutered. HOLA has been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic but plans to resume spay/neuter campaigns this year.

Melissa is a devoted mom to Harvey, a 5-year-old Rottweiler, Koda, a 5-year-old Akita-mix, and her two gray rescue cats, Odin and Foster.