Councilmen question possible uses of police dog

McCOOK, Neb. — A McCook City Councilman asked whether the purchase of a dog for drug detection included in the 2018-19 budget would be multi-trained to perform other tasks as well.

Saying it was an important investment for the city police department and timely, Councilman Jerry Calvin asked at the McCook City Council meeting Monday night if the drug detection dog, included in the city police department’s 2018-19 budget, could help out in other instances, such as tracking individuals or police protection.

“People who wander away to where they shouldn’t be, barricaded in homes, domestic violence situations....I’m looking at the human officer safety,” said Calvin, a retired police officer. He noted that police officers are shot and stabbed every day, and not just in urban cities but in “Smalltown, USA.”

McCook Police Chief Ike Brown said that dogs trained for police officer protection have a higher incidence of biting so it would not be conducive for the department’s planned use of the dog. As the department plans to take the dog to schools, the liability would be much higher, he added.

As far as locating people, single-purpose dogs, like the kind the department is planning to purchase to detect drugs, track mainly by ground disturbance, Brown said, instead of by scent, like bloodhounds.

He agreed it was a trade-off, using a single-purpose dog instead of a dog trained for multiple uses, but that the instances of using a dog to get inside buildings were rare. Responding to a question by Councilman Bruce McDowell about locating lost people, Brown said drug detection dogs are trained to a degree to do this, but outside of bloodhounds, most drug detection canines track by ground disturbance.

Also Monday night, the council unanimously approved city employee salaries and the new city manager’s salary for the 2018-19 budget.

As separate items, the council approved the “Employee Classified Pay Plan” and Nate Schneider’s salary, both with cost of living (2 percent) and merit raises (2.5 percent). Long-time employees receive a longevity increase instead of a merit increase.

Schneider’s current salary of $97,567 was increased with a 2 percent cost of living increase ($1,951) and a 2.5 percent merit raise ($2,439), for a salary of $101,957.

The employee classified pay plan was modified this year with the re-classification of a position to “Human resource officer” at the compensation of $15.078 to $21.221. This was clarified at the meeting Monday night as a regular city employee and not in the police department.