TONAWANDA, N.Y. -- For 23 years, the animal rights community has had a fierce advocate leading the SPCA serving Erie County, but now Barbara Carr is preparing to retire.
"I had sort of a bucket list for the SPCA serving…and I've done all those things, they're all finished, you know?" said Carr, in a sit down interview with 2 On Your Side.
Hired in 1993, Carr is retiring on March 18 after 23 years as executive director of the SPCA.
Her bucket list included a bigger building, humane education, and reducing the number of animals euthanized.
Today, the SPCA will not put down a healthy animal.
In her early years, achieving that goal started with a dog that had no back feet. It was, otherwise, healthy.
Carr arranged for him to get prosthetics.
"We named that dog Footsie. Footsie went on to work in a veterans’ hospital in Detroit for all of his life with amputees,” she said.
In addition to Footsie, Carr's legacy lives in pictures on the walls of animals the SPCA helped save and rehab to join police K-9 units and more.
Dr. Helene Chevalier, head veterinarian, says one of Carr’s biggest strengths was always pushing the envelope. "She's taught me a lot as far as always pushing and thinking outside the box. Always new ideas. She's very avant garde, if I may say,” Chevalier said. “But always to better the care for the animals."
Carr also helped develop the SPCA’s wildlife program, the second biggest in New York.
But it hasn't all been pleasant, and 2 On Your Side has been there for many of those stories. Carr recalls one such story in 2003, when a puppy mill raid revealed the mistreatment of more than 100 dogs, cats, and birds in Angola. "That was one of those cases where it was incredibly sad to see those animals, but incredibly wonderful to see them heal and go off in to new homes,” said Carr.
Over the years, Carr has been one of Erie County's strongest animal advocates.
"She has a great vision,” said longtime colleague Lynn Strickland. “And we don't always agree; nobody does. You can't argue with the strides that she's made and the positive reinforcement she's given us, and the positive aura around the shelter from where we started."
"I do want to say thank you,” Carr said, with tears in her eyes. “We've been so blessed with this wonderful community, with our wonderful media partners, with our wonderful sponsors, our great donors, and our volunteers...just...thank you."
Carr’s career in animal welfare spans two states and 30+ years, but it was 1993 when she started her work here in Western New York.