BARCS Rescue in Cremona has taken a stand against the proposed development of an $850,000 dog breeding facility in Mountain View County. 

In May, the county’s municipal planning commission approved a development permit for a proposed kennel north of Cochrane. The facility proposed a 5,800-square-foot building that would include a livable dwelling. The proposal detailed that up to 55 dogs would be kept on-site, approximately 25 to 28 breeding females, seven to 10 males, and 20 puppies.

“The red flags came up pretty quick for our organization when we saw this development application” explains Amanda Thomson with BARCS Rescue. ”Which is why we've started the petition and we were trying to fight and appeal this development.”

Working closely with another rescue, Pause4Change, BARCS began the process of appealing the development.

“We originally posted about our displeasure and our red flags and concerns about it, and we had some really good community feedback. We looked into the appeal process and it had a $425 fee that was associated with it. Within a few hours, we were able to fundraise the money and we had lots of wonderful people willing to pay just the full cost to help us get this appeal in which was amazing.”

BARCS was able to submit its appeal just hours before the deadline.

Thomson is also working hard to ensure that the right message is getting attached to the petition and appeal. “We're not using this as a rescue versus breeder, we're not anti-breeders and we definitely agree that there is a time and place for ethical breeding for dogs.”

“We are concerned with the unethical side of it that we saw, the square footage with the number of dogs that they have, or claim that they're going to have.”

“In their application, it says that all the dogs will be situated with bark collars. We've done our research and we found the breeders and we've seen pictures and videos of the mama dogs that they have at their facilities who are labouring, wearing bark collars, really pushing us on the dog advocacy side of it.”

A petition by the rescue has also been launched to stop the development of the facility and currently boasts over 12,000 signatures.

Mountain View County is currently working on setting a date and panel for the review of the appeal.