Jordan’s Way to bring wild antics to raise money for Danville animal shelter

From 6 to 9 p.m., Kris Rotonda, the founder of Jordan's Way, will live broadcast the antics on Facebook to get viewers to donate to the animal shelter.

Rotonda founded his nonprofit and named it after a shelter rescue, Jordan, who died. The dog spent 3 ½ years looking for a home before connecting with Rotonda.

After 11 years together, Jordan died of cancer. Since then, Rotonda set out on a traveling mission to raise money for shelters around the nation.

In Danville, the money raised will go into the April Hogan Shelter Animal Fund. 

"This money is used to pay for the special veterinary treatment shelter animals need to become more adoptable," Paulette Dean, the executive director of the Danville Area Humane Society, said in a statement.

"For example, the fund was recently used to pay for a leg amputation of a poodle," she explained. "All animals, of course, receive treatment needed; this fund goes beyond the routine treatments."

Funds are raised through wild challenges and stunts, like whipped cream pies in the face or slime dumps, all while spotlighting animals awaiting adoptions.

This is the third time Kris has been to Danville," Kathy Contratto, board president, said in a statement. "We're looking forward to a great evening and hope people join in the fun."

The first event in 2020 raised $17,000.

The Danville shelter continues to come under public criticism for high euthanasia rates. However, shelter leaders point to the open-admission policy as the reason.

That's why the Danville facility and one in Lynchburg took in around the same number of animals last year. In 2025, 3,184 found their way into the Danville shelter, and only 70 more — 3,254 — wound up in Lynchburg.

Jill Mollohan, executive director of the Lynchburg Humane Society, said the similar intake numbers are due to Danville's status as open admission.

"They take in every single pet that comes through their doors," Mollohan told the Register & Bee in a phone interview in May. "From Williamsburg, they would take it in."

Dean has long said that if the Danville shelter did not take in animals surrendered by owners, the pets would die "horrible deaths," like starvation or being hit by vehicles when turned on the streets.

Outcomes are vastly different, with only 3% of animals at the Lynchburg Humane Society euthanized last year compared to 58% in Danville.

Supporters of open admission shelters say the kill rates don't tell the whole story. While a shelter like Danville may euthanize more than half of the animals that come in, other facilities — called managed intakes — don't have those numbers attached, but the animals not accepted likely suffer the same fate.

"If you turn animals away, they don't disappear," Sharon Adams, the chair of the Virginia Alliance for Animal Shelters, told the Register & Bee in May. 

"So if you don't count them, they don't count," she explained of the animals that aren't accepted to managed intake shelters but end up dead.