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10
PARTY IN THE PARK
July 18, 2013
425461.071813 DTBVT
2013
SUMMER EVENTS
...Bringing our Community Together
International Celebration
JUL 27
11 AM - 5 PM
Beaverton Last Tuesday
JUL 30
|
AUG27
5-8PM
Flicks by the Fountain
AUG 2, 9, 16, 23
Dusk
www.BeavertonOregon.gov/Events | 503.526.2559 | www.Facebook.com/CityofBeaverton
First Friday
AUG2
|
SEP6
|
OCT 4
5-8PM
Celebration Parade
SEP 7
10 AM
Bike Beaverton
SEP 8
1 PM
By SAUNDRA SORENSON
Beaverton Valley Times
A
s thousands gather for this year’s
Party in the Park, they’ll have the
chance to watch Beaverton’s best,
brightest — and most adorable —
in action when the Beaverton Police K-9 Unit
returns to the HMT Complex.
Officer Tony Bastinelli expects that all five
of the city’s teams will be there, doing dem-
onstrations of the dogs’ speed and agility.
Bastinelli has been working with a canine
partner since 2009. He calls working on the
K-9 team the best job there is.
“We do demonstrations of patrol work,
which is basically the human owner finding
bad guys,” he says, “or objects associated
with the human owner.”
There will also be some demonstration of
how the narcotics detection dogs work.
Like many police dogs, Bastinelli’s part-
ner, Kahz, is a German shepherd — a breed
Bastinelli jokes is sometimes too intelligent.
But that means Kahz is qualified to serve in
two areas, having been cross-trained for
both tracking and drug detail. Such prepara-
tion requires more than 600 hours initially,
with weekly maintenance training.
The ideal police dog not only has strong
olfactory senses, he is marked by a strong
toy drive, Bastinelli explains.
“We train our dogs based on a toy reward
system, and when they do what they’re
asked to do, they get a paycheck, if you will
— a toy. We want dogs that will give any-
thing for that toy.”
“You want the dog to have a good temper-
ament,” he adds, describing how intense de-
votion must, in a sense, be turned on and off
in the dogs, since they must also be very so-
ciable — after all, they are often on patrol.
“We take them to schools, do demonstra-
tions,” Bastinelli says, like those at Party in
the Park.
Most police dogs don’t mind showing off,
and are able to differentiate between target-
ing a suspect and interacting with the pub-
lic. Part of this is due to the healthy work-
life balance the dogs enjoy — each resides
with his handler.
“When we go home, we definitely don’t
work,” Bastinelli says. “I don’t hide drugs
for him at my house. He’s just a dog.”
It’s a delicate balance between training
and home life, he says, especially at first.
Bastinelli has worked and lived with his K9
since Kahz was two and a half years old.
“When the dog’s new, for that period
they’re in school, for the first year you’re to-
gether, you definitely want to draw a line,”
he says. “You don’t want them to get their
play or their toy from home, because then
they don’t have to do anything” at work.
After four years on the force, Kahz has a
few notable accomplishments, like tracking
down a knife that was used in a stabbing,
nine hours after the incident occurred.
“He’s captured bad guys, found drugs,”
Bastinelli says. He is especially good at
tracking down anything hidden in a com-
partment — a not uncommon tactic crimi-
nals use to conceal what police often refer to
as the big four: marijuana, methamphet-
amine, cocaine and heroin.
When Kahz is ready for retirement, he’ll
likely go the way of most police dogs, and
continue residing with Bastinelli. Dogs are
viewed as “a very expensive tool in the de-
partment,” Bastinelli says, so this transition
requires that handlers purchase the K9 from
the city, generally for about $1.
In the meantime, Kahz is fit for duty — and
likely, just as excited to take part in Party in
the Park as the crowd is to watch him. “They
enjoy it, it’s fun,” Bastinelli says. “They know
it’s a demonstration. They’re smart.”
The Beaverton Police K-9 Unit demonstra-
tion is from 12 to 1 p.m. on Saturday, July 27.
For more information, visit thprd.org.
Dogs that pack heat
Beaverton K-9
Officer Kahz
attacks Officer
Matt Barrington,
who plays the
“bad guy,” during
a demonstration
of the Beaverton
Police
Department K-9
Unit at the Party
in the Park.
TIMES FILE PHOTO:
JOHN LARIVIERE
■
Beaverton Police’s K-9 Unit shows off