Judy Mills & Lis Williams Overman Share

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There are many cham­pi­ons for ani­mals who both work for and vol­un­teer at Mar­i­on Ani­mal Care and Con­trol. Two of them are long­time vol­un­teers, Judy Mills and Lis Williams Overman.

Mills is a Mar­i­on native and Mar­i­on High School grad­u­ate with an associate’s degree from Indi­ana Busi­ness Col­lege. She is a state-cer­ti­fied med­ical assis­tant with over 35 years in the health­care field. Tak­ing care of peo­ple, par­tic­u­lar­ly the elder­ly, has been a call­ing for her, but she also loves to care for ani­mals. In 2013, she began vol­un­teer­ing at the MACC shelter.

Shel­ter Man­ag­er, Brit­tney Shrout, described Mills as more of a fam­i­ly mem­ber than a vol­un­teer. ​“She is the strongest woman I know.”

In 2019, Mills began to have health con­cerns. In spring of 2021, Mills was diag­nosed with Amy­otroph­ic Lat­er­al Scle­ro­sis (ALS). Despite her med­ical con­di­tion, she still comes in when she is able, and wants to encour­age oth­ers who are fac­ing health chal­lenges to keep doing what they can, such as volunteering.

Mills has also vol­un­teered at nurs­ing homes and sup­port­ed health fundraisers.

Anoth­er cham­pi­on for ani­mals is Lis Williams Over­man. Over­man grad­u­at­ed from New Cas­tle High School and lived in Indi­anapo­lis before Mar­i­on. She received two degrees from Ball State and a master’s from IWU in finance, and would serve many years in that field before retir­ing. Upon mov­ing to Mar­i­on with her hus­band, Scott, in 2017, she noticed a large num­ber of stray cats in the neigh­bor­hood. She became involved with MACC and oth­er res­cues and spay/​neuter groups to help con­trol the fer­al pop­u­la­tion in the area which she con­tin­ues with a goal to not let them go hungry.

Shrout said Over­man brings a lot to the shel­ter in many ways. ​“For exam­ple, Lis comes in to cud­dle with kit­tens adjust­ing to shel­ter life and has trans­port­ed them to res­cues all over.”

Over­man expressed grat­i­tude for her husband’s help, the com­mit­ment of her neigh­bors, and praised MACC staff and the oth­er vol­un­teers for their hard work and dedication.