Community rallies behind K-9 needs

I attended a terrific concert recently at our River Campus that turned into a celebration of success in that we as a community have achieved our goal to fund four dogs for our K-9 unit of the Cape Girardeau Police Department.

I will write more about the concert later in this column, but first I want to develop the thinking and process behind this fundraising effort within our great city of Cape Girardeau.

We presently are staffed with two K-9 officers within our department. They get heavily taxed at times due to the fact they cannot cover our city on all shifts. Chief Wes Blair and his staff proposed to us early this year we undertake an effort to underwrite private funding to cover the costs of four K-9 units that would enable our department to staff the dogs on all shifts. The total cost of acquiring the dogs, training them and training the officers approaches $70,000. The existing dogs are nearing retirement age and will need to be replaced in the near future.

I realized this would be a daunting task but also a tremendous opportunity. Our department, again under the leadership of chief Blair, has worked tirelessly over the past months to assimilate its officers into our community on a “friend-raising” effort. Ultimately, we thought this would be a great effort to be able to both fund-raise and friend-raise.

I (we) totally underestimated the outpouring of support we would receive from our citizens.

We immediately began receiving donations from all around the city. Our staff made presentations and we received funds both large and small from many, including a significant check from a former citizen who presently lives out of state. Most recently, we accepted a gift from the Elks Club in the amount of $15,000. Wow!

Our own Jerry Ford came to us several months ago, saying he wanted to help in some way in this process. He proposed doing a concert with his orchestra at the River Campus. We said, “Go for it,” and Jerry in his own way solicited his orchestra, additional local talent and sponsors along with some additional assistance from other local businesses and citizens.

He assembled, produced and directed an absolutely terrific concert performance which I and nearly 400 attended Saturday night. It included a tremendous amount of (donated) local talent, which included Jerry’s Orchestra, Andrew Moore, Bruce Zimmerman, Casey Janet Mills, Steve Shaffner, Mike Renick & Zach Priester, Broderick Twiggs, Tina Trickey and the Voices of Harmony. This concert with sponsors and admissions resulted in our largest gift of $20,000 for the K-9 effort.

This concert became both a fundraiser and a celebration in that it culminated the full funding of the desired goal of achieving four K-9 units for the department and for the protection of our officers and our citizens.

I want to take this time to thank and applaud chief Blair for his vision and leadership in leading this effort, and also for the entire department’s dedication to continue to relate and befriend all of the citizens of our city.

Our citizens are in good hands with the dedication and professionalism of our Cape Girardeau Police Department. Yes, there will be continuing challenges, but this department is well equipped with the necessary leadership and training to meet these challenges and continue to move our community toward a safer environment.

Harry E. Rediger is the mayor of Cape Girardeau.