The Richmonder 25: Christie Chipps Peters leads Richmond Animal Care and Control with optimism

For Christie Chipps Peters, there are no “regular days.”  

The director of Richmond Animal Care and Control (RACC) deals with everything from adoption to advocating for animals in unsafe situations. 

“I would say (we do) everything from having people bring us their pets and people reaching out to us trying to figure out a solution for their own pets,” Peters said. 

The only consistent part of her week is a Wednesday court date, when cases are heard ranging from off-leash dogs to people killing their animals. 

“Going to court and watching the work unfold and (seeing perpetrators) being held responsible for doing really ugly things is very rewarding,” Peters said. 

While her job can be full of hard or gloomful situations, longtime friend and coworker Whytney Barnett said Peters maintains a positive outlook. 

“As hard as her job is, and as constant as it is, she stays positive, and she's very easy to be around at all times, even when she's super stressed,” Barnett said.

One of Peters' accomplishments as director was starting the Tommie Fund, an effort to positively help other shelters after a tragedy. In 2019 a dog named Tommie was tied to a pole in Abner Clay Park and lit on fire. Despite an effort that included help from the VCU burn unit, RACC was unable to save him. 

“We had the most amazing community outpouring of support for such a horrific situation that then transpired into what we call now is our Tommie Fund. … My goal was to be able to have other animal control agencies that would never have the opportunity to have a foundation support them, essentially use our foundation, so we set up the Tommie Fund for any participating municipal shelter with a vet budget of under $100,000, which is most of them in Virginia,” Peters said. 

Whenever shelters call asking to use the fund to help save their animals, Peters' answer is always the same – yes. 

“I think the one baby drop of horrible suffering that happened with Tommie just created this world of compassion and caring that self perpetuates still, and that is helping to save lives across the state of Virginia,” Peters said.

Collaboration and support for others is at the heart of what Peters does. Hanover Director of Animal Control Jeff Parker has worked with Peters for the past 12 years.

“We bounce things back and forth of what's going on in the city and what's going on here in the county, and kind of get ideas from each other and kind of use each other as good resources,” Parker said.

Peters' passion for animal care came from a love of animals and a unique connection to them.

“I used to ride horses when I was younger and I could always communicate with the horses that everyone else was having trouble with,” she said. “I just had a weird connection with them, that they would calm down, or I could read them. It's very woo woo.” 

This connection to animals has stuck, and even now Peters said she can “feel it in (her) stomach if a dog is gonna be unsafe.”

While the focus of Peter's job is to care for animals, Barnet added that “she always looks out for the people too.” 

“She really helps the community in all aspects, not only in the animal world, but she has collected diapers for child services,” Barnet said. “Because RACC has such a huge following on social media, all she has to do is say, 'Hey, we need this,' and it just shows up.”

One of Peters' favorite parts of her job is running the adoption desk every Sunday, something she started when she was hired as director. 

"When I was hired, I was like, we have to be open on Sundays because people are not working on Sundays so they want to come and adopt animals,” Peters said. “The management at the time said, ‘Well, we don't have enough staff,’ and I said, ‘Then I'll run the adoption desk on Sundays,’ and that has stuck.” 

Running the adoption desk allows Peters to “take off her director hat” and see the “love and light” part of the job, she said. 

“It's the best part of people coming in looking for a forever best friend, and for me it's really rewarding to see everything come full circle,” Peters said. “A good ending makes all the badness in between a little bit more palpable.”

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