Members of the blind community are facing delays of up to three years to get a guide dog.
A number of factors come into play, such as a clients' needs, environment, and the tough criteria for dogs.
Dan Sheppherd is one more than 40 people in line to be matched, he's been waiting for over two years.
Blind Low Vision chief executive John Mulka told 1 NEWS, "Right now we're going at, on average, 15 months ... there's a number of factors that contribute to that ... it's not for lack of effort".
He says the organisation's working on reducing the wait time to six months with a new centralised training programme.
"We used to do it all over the country in New Zealand, and we're going to move to a centre-based model here in South Auckland," he said.
Wendy Mellberg Haecker, Blind Low Vision's Guide Dogs operation manager said, "It has to do with all our trainers working from here, and what that will allow us to do, is train more dogs in shorter periods of time".
Haecker said they're building the training team up, and each trainer will take on a certain number of dogs to work through a strict week to week programme.
"It's not something we've done here before ... it's just a more efficient way of working."
Mulka says with the new centralised training module, they'll look to have a set of dogs ready to go every 12 weeks.
Up to 20 dogs go through formal training at any one time and that process alone takes four months.
The criteria is tough and fewer than half the puppies born into the programme become working dogs.
"There's a lot that goes intro training a guide dog, they have a huge responsibility to keep their handler safe," Haecker said.
"One might think matching a guide dog is a relatively easy process, but a lot depends on the person's needs," Mulka added.
The Guide Dog programme also relies on public support.
It takes nearly two years, and more than $50,000 to raise and train just one guide dog.
But the organisation's around 700 volunteers short for its annual street appeal, starting on March 25, and it's calling on more people to help.
"Be that through volunteering or making donations, that's going to support more guide dogs in the community," said Sheppherd.
He hopes it's not long until he finds his match, despite being a confident white cane user.
"With a cane, you have to interpret the information the cane is giving you; with the dog you have a level of trust, you're a part of that team," he said.
"A guide dog is going to be supporting my mobility, my independence."
SHARE ME