By By MARY-ALLISON LANCASTER – Managing editor
Students participating in the Brewton Middle School DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) program are calling on everyone in the community to help them choose the name of the new Brewton Police Department's drug-sniffing canine.
After the previous dog died of natural causes, Brewton Police Chief Monte McGougin asked Brewton City Council members with help purchasing a new drug dog. Chief McGougin was given the go-ahead to purchase the new canine several sessions ago.
DARE was founded in 1983 in Los Angeles. On the official DARE Web site, it says that the program is now being implemented in nearly 80 percent of the nation's school districts and in more than 54 countries around the world.
DARE is a police officer-led series of classroom lessons that teaches children from kindergarten through 12th grade how to resist peer pressure and live productive drug and violence-free lives.
According to officers, the male German Shepherd has been in Pensacola going through rigorous training. He will officially begin duty in two weeks after training is complete.
Lt. Feast Broughton, who is the DARE officer, has been teaching the program at the middle school for 11 years. He, along with handler and Officer Jason Yoder, will use the new dog during routine drug searches in the city and within the school yards during random drug searches Chief McGougin implemented this year. The dog will also be taken to all of the classrooms participating in the DARE program so that the kids will get to know the newest member of the police department.
According to Broughton, students in the BMS DARE program have been working tirelessly and competing against each other with the hopes that their chosen name for the dog will be picked by members of the community.
The six classes have come up with six different names. The kids in each class are asking community members to help them name the new drug dog. &#8220The one that gets the most votes wins,” Broughton said.
He added that the kids have been asked to &#8220campaign hard” for their dog's name to win. The following six names are the ones the kids have chosen. Help the BMS DARE classes choose from the following: