Clovis PD restores K9 unit thanks to community fundraising

CLOVIS, Calif. (KFSN) -- A generous community response has allowed the Clovis Police Department to restore its K9 unit which was disbanded six years ago.

Clovis Police will now go on patrol with new protective partners, and Jax the Belgian Malinois is one of the newest members of the K9 unit.

Officer Brent Drum's new partner was trained in France, so he only understands French commands.

"Repos, repos, rest. I tell him to stay, relax - distraire," he told Jax. "Little things like that. I'm pretty good in French now."

And the community's been pretty good at raising funds to restore the K9 unit. The $20 stuffed dogs the department sold were a hit.

"We sold over 2,000 of these little dogs to the community," Police Chief Matt Basgall said.

Basgall said individual and business donations allowed the department to top the $75,000 goal and reach $136,000.

"Our goal was to see if we could do this in a year and for this to happen within two months, and the recent number we did is just awesome," Basgall said. "The community is just so great to us."

Corda the German Shepherd also received his badge. The dogs will offer security and help reduce safety concerns among officers in the streets.

"He'll be utilized in searching buildings and burglaries, commercial burglaries, residential burglaries, when bad guys run from us," Phil Garcia with the department explained.

Corda and Jax join department veteran Murphy on the K9 unit. And the attentive Springer Spaniel is an expert in narcotics detection.

"He smells odors if you have methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin, opium and marijuana," Matt Balbach said.

The donations will allow Clovis Police to buy three more K9 officers which will join the department in September.