K9 AcquistionMasterpiece on the Mississippi
TO: The Honorable Mayor and City Council Members
FROM: Michael C. Van Milligen, City Manager
SUBJECT: K9 Acquisition
DATE: February 1, 2011
Dubuque
bitil
All-America City
1
2007
The City of Dubuque has received information from former Dubuque Police Department
K9 handler Randy Roy, who now works with U.S. Army K9 units, that the City can
obtain a K9 trained by the U.S. Army on explosive detection at no cost. The dog is an
approximate one year old female Belgian Malinois named "Four ". The K9 is already
"imprinted" on a variety of explosives and it is planned to expand the training to include
additional explosive and flammable substances and potentially for human scent
detection for tracking purposes.
This K9 would serve several duties. It could be used in building sweeps (schools,
dignitary visits), fire scene investigations for the detection of accelerants, for bomb
detection and for open -air tracking, such as for missing or lost people or suspect
tracking.
Besides the detection capabilities that would be available to local law and fire officials, a
nice component of this type of K9 unit is the comparative cost. Since the K9 would only
be used on an "as needed" basis, the City would not need to equip a specialized squad
car or have some of the other costs associated with K9 units. The dog would remain at
the handler's residence until it is needed. This limited use of the K9 will also extend the
working life of the K9.
Additional costs that would be incurred would be for training and housing. Currently the
K9 unit is fed and has its health concerns covered by donating partners. These
community partners, Theisen's, PetMed and Dr. John Haupert, have agreed to the
same arrangements with a new K9. Basic housing and work equipment including a
kennel, leashes, harnesses, bowls, officer uniform, etc. have been priced and will cost
approximately $1,000. The upfront costs of between $4,200 and $5,700 would be
covered by $5,000 in drug forfeiture funds.
Chief of Police Mark Dalsing recommends City Council approval to proceed with the
adoption of the K9, purchase of equipment and training of a new handler.
I concur with the recommendation and respectfully request Mayor and City Council
approval.
MCVM:jh
Attachment
cc: Barry Lindahl, City Attorney
Cindy Steinhauser, Assistant City Manager
Mark M. Dalsing, Chief of Police
72—. ,
Miciael C. Van Milligen
THE CITY OF
DUB E MEMORANDUM
Masterpiece on the Mississippi
TO: Michael C. Van Milligen
City Manager
FR: Mark M. Dalsing
Chief of Police
RE: K9 Acquisition
INTRODUCTION
This memorandum will outline the Dubuque Police Department acquiring an
explosive detecting K9.
BACKGROUND
February 3, 2011
The Dubuque Police Department and the Dubuque Fire Department had been having
informal conversations about policy and procedure in response to joint scenes,
including those involving explosives. The conversations have also included revisiting
the need for a bomb squad. The November 2010 bomb threat incident at City Hall
resulted in formal conversation.
In late November 2010, representatives of the Dubuque Police Department and the
Dubuque Fire Department formally met to discuss the above topics. A formal bomb
squad was discussed and it was decided that this should be researched further.
During this topic, Capt. Jim Lembke brought forward a suggestion that we
determined was a very viable option. Lembke suggested that we consider obtaining a
K9 trained in the detection of explosives & flammables. Lembke supervises the
department's K9 operations and remains in contact with former Dubuque Police
Department K9 handler Randy Roy who now works with U.S. Army K9 units. Through
discussions, Lembke learned that the Army "retires" their K9's into civilian law
enforcement use at no cost to the agencies and that the K9's still have several years
of working life available.
Under such a plan, the department would obtain a K9 at little to no cost as compared
to other K9's, for use as an explosives detection K9. This K9 could serve several
duties. It could be used in building sweeps (schools, dignitary visits), fire scene
investigations for the detection of accelerants, and for bomb detection. Keeping in
mind the recent incident at City Hall, under a similar situation we would respond the
K9, have it "search" the bag and then respond accordingly. In the City Hall case, the
K9 would not have indicated on the bag and we would have downgraded our
response and removed the bag for examination and ended the situation. If a K9 were
to ever indicate on a parcel we would know explosives were detected and would
need to escalate the response and have a bomb squad respond. Additionally these
dogs can be cross trained into multiple fields. The initial scenario discussed was
obtaining a cross trained K9 capable of explosives detection as well as open -air
tracking such as for missing or lost people or suspect tracking.
Besides the detection capabilities that would be available to local law and fire
officials, a nice component of this type of unit is the comparative cost. Since the unit
would only be used on an "as needed" basis, we would not need to equip a specialized
squad car or have some of the other costs associated with K9 units. The dog would
remain at the handler's residence until it is needed. This limited use of the K9 will
also extend the working life of the K9. Traditionally daily -use K9's have a working
life of approximately 5 -7 years. Because of the limited use of an explosives detecting
K9, we would potentially be able to add several years of working life to this K9. The
group decided that we would continue to explore bomb response options with the K9
being the priority topic to review with a formal bomb squad remaining as a
secondary review topic.
Recently Capt. Lembke received a call from Randy Roy indicating that he has a K9
that would be a good candidate for civilian law enforcement work. The K9 is trained
on explosive detection but is not adapting to cross training for apprehension (bite)
duty. Because the Army wants the dual training, they do not wish to keep this K9. The
K9 is an approximate one year old, female Belgian Malinois named "Four ". The Army
would allow us to "adopt" the dog from them at no cost. This K9 is already
"imprinted" on a variety of explosives and it is planned to expand the training to
include additional explosives and flammable substances and potentially for human
scent detection for tracking purposes.
Additional costs that we would incur would be for training and housing. Currently
our K9 unit is fed and has its health concerns covered by donating partners. These
community partners, Theisen's, PetMed and Dr. John Haupert, have agreed to the
same arrangements with a new K9. Basic housing and work equipment including a
kennel, leashes, harnesses, bowls, officer uniform, etc. have been priced and will cost
approximately $1000. The most expensive items would be the training for the
handler and the training equipment for the K9. A training kit containing samples for
ongoing detection training ranges in price from $1500 to $3000. The training for the
handler would take place in Indianapolis, IN. It is a two week training session where
we would need to cover the officer travel, meals and hotel expenses. The training
and certification at this point is free. A preliminary estimate of travel and housing
would be $1900 for one officer and $2700 for two. We are pricing this for two
officers as we are considering sending our current K9 unit at the same time for
additional training. The next training block is in late February 2011.
On February 3, 2011 the Control Board for the Dubuque Drug Task Force (DDTF)
held a scheduled meeting. At this meeting I requested funding from drug forfeiture
funds to offset the potential expenses. The Control Board unanimously approved
funding up to $5,000 to cover equipment and training expenses. Any additional
expenses beyond this $5,000 would be covered by current department funds.
An additional K9 could have some future budget impact. Currently we are able to
fund our existing K9 operations out of budgeted Patrol funds. It is expected that we
will continue to do so with a second K9 but we might consider a separate line in the
budget solely for K9 operations. It would take some discussion as to whether this
would be entirely police budget funded or if it would be a joint police -fire project.
The Dubuque Police Department is continuing to research a formal bomb squad and
available options and possible expenses. The acquisition of a K9 would be viewed as
a component and would not end this research.
CONCLUSION & RECOMMENDATION
The addition of a K9 for explosive detection has been deemed as the most feasible
option for our immediate needs when a bomb squad's start up costs, recurring
expenses and training requirements are taken into consideration. The opportunity
to obtain a young, already trained K9 will fill an immediate void in the department as
well as save the department $5,000 to $10,000 in the purchase of a new K9. The use
of drug forfeiture funds will allow the department to fund this new project with little
to no immediate budget impact.
ACTION REQUESTED
Review of this memorandum and City Council approval to proceed with the adoption
of the K9, purchase of equipment, and training of a new handler.
cc: Dan Brown