Your gift of any size today creates freedom for those who experience disabilities.
Domino Service Dogs (DSD) assists people with disabilities who are training their own service dog by providing a 2-year owner-trained service dog program. We are located in Lakewood, Colorado. At DSD, we believe that training the handler is as important as training the service dog, so we have developed a program that trains both the service dog and the handler at the same time. Our program uses humane, reward-based training and teaches important dog-handling and caretaking skills.
We have been helping people to train their own service dogs as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit since 2013, and have graduated dozens of service dog teams. DSD is run BY people with disabilities FOR people with disabilities. We fill a unique niche in Colorado by providing service dog training at an affordable rate.
DSD is also an important community setting where people who are often isolated can join others with disabilities in gaining new skills and exploring the public in Denver. People with disabilities join us, and together with our dogs, we learn, try, fail, try again, and succeed. We broaden our clients’ worlds by practicing accessing the public with service dogs in training. We are so proud of our clients: they have learned and accomplished amazing feats, and they have made their lives better.
It is the mission of Domino Service Dogs to break down barriers to service dog ownership by assisting people with disabilities to train their own service dogs using humane, reward-based techniques.
The DSD Story: From Personal Necessity to Community Mission
The foundation for Domino Service Dogs (DSD) was laid over a decade ago when the daughter of our Founder and CEO, Barbara Henry, suffered an injury resulting in permanent paralysis. Refusing to let her mobility define her, she insisted on a service dog at just eight years old.
Ms. Henry quickly discovered a significant gap in the industry: most organizations charged prohibitive fees and restricted placements to children over twelve or those with terminal diagnoses. Drawing on her extensive equine training background, Ms. Henry spent two years training Badger, a 95-pound Great Pyrenees, to assist her daughter with mobility tasks like walking, navigating floor transfers, and pulling a manual wheelchair.
Badger did more than provide physical support; he restored her independence and self-esteem. As Ms. Henry helped more local teams overcome similar obstacles, she realized the demand for a "by us, for us" model. What began as a personal mission grew into a formal organization that has now supported over 200 owner-trained service dog teams to date, empowering people with disabilities four paws at a time.
Organization name
Domino Service Dogs
other names
DSD
2013
Tax id (EIN)
46-3426784
Category
Human Services
Organization Size
Medium Organization
Address
6505 W. Alameda Unit 101Mailing
PO Box 140245Jefferson County, CO, US