(Editor’s note: During the month of August, we will spotlight volunteers in our towns. This is the first in a weekly series celebrating those who work, without pay, to better their communities.)

BY IRENE LABOMBARDE

In the 15 years she’s lived in town, Jayne Spaulding has volunteered countless hours trying to make Bedford and the world a better place.

Her passions include animal rescue and gardening, land conservation and public office. In 2006, she was elected one of Bedford’s six representatives to the state Legislature.

“My philosophy in life is to try to make a positive difference. I thought serving at the state level would give me a chance to work on things that need to be fixed. I may have been naive, but I’m just trying to make a difference, and every single day I learn something new,” she said.

Spaulding joined the Bedford Land Trust in 1994, and served as its chairman for several years. She resigned only to take on the more challenging position as co-chairman of the fundraising committee for the Benedictine property. When the Benedictine Sisters offered the 27-acre parcel off Wallace Road for sale to the town in 1998, Spaulding and her colleagues spent the next seven months helping to raise $800,000 needed to purchase the property. The Land Trust holds the conservation easement that will ensure the open space remains protected and available for passive recreation.

“That’s what really put the Land Trust on the map in Bedford,” said Spaulding. “We went from having a small corner to people wanting to donate land to us, up to the (Bedford Village Common) easement and the Van Loan property. We’ve been extremely busy in the last decade, which is wonderful.”

Spaulding currently serves as the co-chairman of the Bedford Village Common Committee, which is in the process of designing and building a park on town-owned land along Route 101 between Meetinghouse and Bell Hill roads.

“There is so much behind-the-scenes work that goes on,” she said. “You don’t just take bare land and come up with a plan for how it will be used. You have wetlands, and what we are proposing for the area will make it much more valuable. “

For Spaulding, part of the fun  is actually see the project becoming reality.

“The fence is going up soon. People will get a glimpse of it, hopefully by fall,” she said.

In addition to helping conserve land, Spaulding enjoys working the land. She holds a master gardener certification from UNH, and is a past president of the Bedford Garden Club. She runs her own garden consulting business, www.Jayne SpauldingDesign.com.

“It works out great. The legislative session ends by June 30, then I work on gardening,” she said.
Spaulding’s efforts extend to people and animals as well.

“One of my favorite charities is the Animal Rescue League. I have been an avid supporter of them since they were in Goffstown. They just do incredible work,” she said.

Besides giving financial support, Spaulding raises foster kittens. She takes in the mother and newborns so that the kittens don’t have to spend their first weeks of life in a cage.

“They call us when they are really overcrowded, and there is always a need,” said Spaulding.

She is currently nurturing her eighth litter in the past six years. Foster cats have to be kept separate from family pets, so the litter is housed in her 19-year-old daughter Shannon’s bedroom.

“We call her the crazy cat lady,” Spaulding laughed.

In addition to cats, her most recent endeavor has been getting her 1-year-old golden retriever, James, certified as a therapy dog.  Spaulding did not get James with the intention of doing therapy work, but real life intervened.

In March 2007, Spaulding’s father was in hospice care in Ohio, and she brought James along on the trip.

“He nuzzled my Dad’s hand and made my Dad pet him. It really brought home to me just how powerful animals can be,” she said.

That experience led her to seek out classes and in July, James became a certified therapy dog through the Therapy International program offered at Pedigree in Candia.

Although he has not officially begun visitations, Spaulding expects to bring James to the Youth Development Center, YDC, in Manchester. She has visited the facility on state business and was inspired to help.

“I was so impressed with the staff, the facility, how respectful the kids are. What kids besides those kids need unconditional love? They are there because of what adults have done to them, and they need to be given a chance while they can change,” she said.

Because the YDC is a secured facility, there are details to iron out, but Spaulding is confident she and James will be able to make arrangements for therapy visits.

“His job in life is to give love and be loved, and he is very good at that,” she said.

Spaulding and her husband, Richard, an anesthesiologist and former School Board member, have three children, Erika, 23, a graduate of Boston University, who works in marketing; Shannon, 19, a summer lifeguard who plans to study medicine in New Zealand next year; and Duncan, 16, a junior at Northfield/Mount Herman Academy.