Barbara Perry is the Board President. She retired from the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office in 2015 after 23 years, where she was an administrator in the jail.
In May 2009, when it appeared the Lincoln County Animal Shelter (owned and operated by the Sheriff’s Office) would close, Barbara led two training sessions known as “Dream Big”. Community members gave their ideas on how to save the shelter and what they wanted their ideal shelter to be like.
In August of that year Sgt. Perry was appointed to be the Interim Manager of the Animal Shelter, a position she held until a permanent manager was hired in April 2010. During her tenure, she implemented many of the ideas that came from the Dream Big sessions. Additionally, she changed the shelter from open admission / high kill to managed admission where animals were not euthanized to make room for more.
Barbara is originally from Kansas and came to Oregon by way of Nevada. She holds degrees in Education, Law Enforcement, and Public Administration.
Heather Lee-Lindsley is a Board Member-at-Large. She has always been passionate about rescuing animals. Spaying and neutering are so important and she is trying to spread the word. Less unwanted litters mean fewer animals in shelters or worse, being homeless. Heather not only works with CCHS in Lincoln County but also Puplandia in Portland. She is excellent at finding low-cost vet clinics and solutions to helping animals. She is our Facebook administrator. Contact her through Messenger.
Sue Trapp is a Board Member-at-Large. She and her husband, Jeff, and purchased a property in Newport about 20 years ago. They moved here full-time 6 years ago after retiring from the Fire Service. They have ZZ, a 12 y/o Australian Shepherd (watch the movie Marmaduke, he plays Mazie), and Ping, a 5 y/o Pomeranian (he’s just cute), and are working on a feral colony on their property. Sue was raised in a small town in Northern California where she had dogs, cats, goats, horses, and chickens and was a member of 4-H during her youth. As an adult, she began rescuing cats and dogs from private owners so they wouldn’t go to the shelter, and vets in town who knew her wouldn’t say no. She trained or medically rehabilitated them and found them new loving homes. She was a volunteer with Second Time Around Aussie Rescue (STAAR), a national organization based in Bryan, Texas, for 5 years. As a volunteer, she went to shelters or private parties to evaluate and accept Aussies into the organization. She was a foster home and provided basic obedience training, screening applications, home visits, reference checks before placement. She became a volunteer with Animal Friends Rescue Project (AFRP), a local cat and dog rescue organization in Pacific Grove, Monterey County, California. She fostered, did transport, adoption events, and fundraising. Sue was employed with AFRP as the Santa Cruz county manager for 10 years. She coordinated 50-100 volunteers and rescued around 800 animals a year.
Karen Henson is a Board Member-at-Large.
Brian and Lisa Bunnett are Board Members-at-Large. They retired and relocated to the Oregon Coast from Indiana in December 2020. Lisa’s background is in information technology management, while Brian had a long career as a librarian. Both worked for many years in higher education environments. In Indiana, Lisa was a volunteer with a local humane society, cleaning cat cages, fostering cats and kittens, and staffing adoption events. Brian and Lisa also did cat transport for a local rescue that took cats and kittens from primarily high- or 100%-kill shelters in their area and moved them to no-kill shelters and FIV rescues in other areas and states. Over a period of about four years, they transported 600-plus cats and kittens to locations where they could be adopted. Brian and Lisa were thrilled to discover the work that CCHS is doing here in Oregon, especially since it fills two areas that were missing in their local environment in Indiana – support for community cats and TNR for feral cat populations. Their work with CCHS has allowed them to see many different areas of the state and to meet some great people (and cats).