UPDATE: Checotah shelter confirms Carrie Underwood’s donation

Kate Paris of the Checotah Animal Shelter has confirmed that country music superstar Carrie Underwood has committed to build a shelter and donate it to the city. Contrary to earlier reports, there’s no set dollar amount; she has just committed to build a shelter and donate it to the city.

“Her mother saw one of our donation jars and came down to check us out,” Paris said. “She started helping me walk the dogs, feed the dogs and clean up after them. Then Carrie came down and wanted to build a better place. She’s been working on it since last April, and we just finally got a contract signed with the city.”

The Underwood family has been an immense support and help, Paris said, without which she isn’t sure she would have been able to accomplish as much as she has already.

“We’ve worked really hard and gotten around 600 dogs homes,” she said. “Carrie’s parents are awesome, awesome, hard-working people, which is why she is too. There’s no way we could have done any of this if they hadn’t helped.”

The shelter is no-kill, and it works to try to help get pets spayed and neutered to cut down on the overpopulation problem.

“Doing this job is a mental strain,” Paris said. “It’s so hard to find everyone homes.”

Thanks to Carrie, her dream of being able to give the dogs better lives while they’re in her care is about to come true.

Filed under: Good news, Local by Leif Wright