Police and Working K-9 Foundation

The Police and Working K-9 Foundation Cover Your K-9 program has provided essential safety equipment and training for law enforcement K-9 teams in Northern California since 2009 and we are now providing assistance in Southern California, starting with law enforcement K9 teams in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties. We are proud that our Cover Your K-9 bullet-proof vests are made in California and we have distributed hundreds of the custom Level IIIA bulletproof vests to protect law enforcement K-9s in cities and counties in Northern and Southern California since we started our program. This past year we were able to provide protective ballistic vests to K9s at Alameda County Sheriffs Office, Beverly Hills PD, the California Highway Patrol, Concord PD, Contra Costa County Sheriffs Office, Monterey County Sheriff, Oakland PD, Placer County Sheriff, Sacramento PD, San Francisco PD, San Jose PD, San Mateo County Sheriffs Office, Santa Clara County Sheriffs Office, UCLA PD and many others. In the coming year we hope to branch out to other areas of California to assist the K9 teams there with protecting their hardworking K9 teams.Our Cover Your K9 Emergency Medicine Course (which has received national attention) was attended by law enforcement K9 handlers from around California in April and October and they all received the custom Cover Your K9 Trauma Kits valued at over $300. Since starting our K9 emergency medical training in 2011, over 1700 law enforcement K9 handlers from local, state and federal agencies have attended the life-saving training & received K9 trauma kits. We are proud that our Cover Your Trauma Kits and advanced training have saved the lives of several K-9s over the past few years.Each year more K-9s die nationally from heat exhaustion than any other single cause. There have significant advances in the technology for heat alarm systems and we have been on the forefront of introducing these systems. Our Cool Your K9 Patrol Car Heat Alarm program was the first in this state to introduce Ace K-9 WatchDog system with a cell phone app to help keep our loyal K-9s safe while they are on the job. This allows real time communication on the temperature in the vehicle from the two heat sensors in the car, the status of the engine and the air conditioning system to an app on the officers cell phone. In the past, only very basic information was available to a remote pager which often lost a signal when too far away. We are hoping to make sure that as many of our California K9 teams as possible have the proper protection for their K9 vehicles.When police dogs retire they go to live with their handler and become part of the family. The responsibility for their ongoing care and any medical emergencies falls to the handler. We believe that these K9s who have served and protected us so bravely deserve much better in their golden years. To help them we have a special Retired K-9 Emergency Care Fund to assist with up to $1000 toward emergency care. We have learned that many of the elderly police dogs have developed spinal problems due to the demands placed on their bodies from many years of service. We have a new program to provide these retired K9 heroes with specialized low profile mobility Help Em Up Harnesses to assist them with maintaining their daily activities and quality of life,With the help of the Commander at Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield, CA, we established the Defenders Military Working Dog Fund to allow their unit to host specialized K9 training as well as a K9 trial on base to bring together military working dog handlers with police and sheriffs K9 handlers from around California. This fund also provides additional training opportunities for the Travis MWD teams to travel to specialized training that is held off base. The Travis teams provide security on the base, deploy overseas on missions and provide MWD screening for explosives during visits to the state by Federal dignitaries and foreign Heads of State. The mission of this fund is to enhance their training, readiness and opportunities to work and collaborate with regional law enforcement to help keep our communities secure.Pet Food Express has been our primary partner in our communities in raising funds during the annual Cover Your K-9 fundraiser that is held at all of their stores every July. Over 100 K-9 teams come out each year at the Pet Food Express locations to educate the public on the important work that K9 teams do for our communities. With the Pet Food Express donation of pet wash proceeds and donations by their customers in all 60 stores, we raised $166,953 during the Cover Your K9 weekend in 2019. This enabled us to provide our program services to Northern California K9 teams and since we have been able to launch several new programs in Southern California for the first time. This partnership between Pet Food Express, a private company and our non-profit is an excellent example of the great accomplishments that can happen in our communities with creativity and collaboration. We hope that it inspires other companies to reach out and partner with non-profit organizations in their communities.Sonoma Valley Fire and Rescue Authority received 10 Animal Oxygen Mask Kits and 2 K-9 Trauma Kits through our Air for Animals Program. Our Veterinary Liaison Dr. Guillaume Hoareau assisted by volunteer vet assistant Silvia Coverson provided hands-on animal rescue instruction to the firefighters and K-9 Handlers. We are exploring additional ways to reach out and help more K9 teams in the California communities that we have not been able to serve yet. There are many rural K-9 units in California and we are working on ways to assist them in obtaining essential safety gear.