Staff Spotlight: Leslie Valdez

When she’s not taking care of dogs at The Watering Bowl, Leslie spends time volunteering with their cousins—the wolves.

At the Endangered Wolf Center in Eureka, Leslie loves learning about and helping one of the most at-risk animal species in North America. “It’s truly an amazing place, and the research and recovery efforts they are conducting are going to make a huge impact,” says Leslie.

And she sees that same spirit of dedication at The Watering Bowl. “I’ve never met such a passionate group of people as my fellow co-workers, and I’ve never been more proud to tell people where I work,” she says, unprompted.

In fact, that’s probably why she fits in so well. Currently, Leslie is serving as our assistant manager at our South County location. And she’s doing a great job of leading and helping to develop some of our new staff training program.

With a degree in biology from UMSL and deep passion for dogs, she helps us live our mission of providing a cage-free canine community every single day.

Her resume is deeper than most twenty-somethings. She started volunteering at the Humane Society of Missouri as a junior volunteer when she was only thirteen. And she tells us that her transition to The Watering Bowl was a natural move. At the time she was putting her biology degree to work with plants, but when she saw the opening with us, “it was like the universe knew I needed a change.”

Leslie is newly engaged to her fiancé, Reiner, and together they recently rescued a red and white cattle dog mix named Maverick. According to Leslie, he’s the perfect hiking buddy, and he makes any family outing an adventure.

She’s a die-hard Cardinals fan and an avid whale watcher. Those two things have very little in common aside from being spectator sports with lots of downtime.

We are big Leslie fans, and we welcome you to ask her all about whales the next time you see her. Or pick up an application for yourself or someone like her the next time you visit our South County location.