K9 BASIC AND DETECTOR COURSE 

Police canines are an effective and necessary law enforcement tool which benefit communities and their police departments.  For over the past 30 years, The Saint Paul Police Department Canine Unit has provided instruction to new and experienced handlers throughout the upper Midwest in the latest police canine training methods and techniques.  The Basic Handler and Detector Course will again be offered February 7, 2022 to May 26^th, 2022.

This course is designed for new handlers and experienced handlers with new canine partners. The beginning of the course focuses on detection, progressing to street canine work.  Highlights include the following:   

• Classroom instruction and hands on applications of modern canine learning theories.
• Detailed explanation and application of Operant Conditioning, Classical Conditioning and “free shaping” of desired behaviors in a police canine.  
• Training and development of a narcotics, explosives, or game detection canine in the discipline of the agencies choosing.
• Instruction on how to properly, and gradually, introduce an electronic training collar to a police canine.  
• Classroom instruction, and application during training scenarios, of police canine related court case laws.  
• Focus on police canines being primarily a locating tool, encompassing location of missing persons, evidence, illegal substances, or criminal suspects. 
• Teaching canines to track on multiple types of surfaces including various types of hard, vegetative, and natural surfaces.
• Building from tracking to trailing techniques.
• Introducing canines to human scent discrimination during tracking/trailing.
• Performing multiple operational deployment scenarios of varying complexity and lengths. 
• Assessment and evaluation of the canine in tracking, building searching, area searching, obedience, evidence recovery, criminal apprehension, and ability to verbally release their canines from an apprehension from distance. 
• Canine teams will also be exposed to searching in a gas environment, and training with simunitions during canine searches. 

Instructors:

Lead Trainer Rob Vetsch and Saint Paul Police Canine Training Staff, Assistant St. Paul City Attorney Judy Hanson, and Sergeant John Cajacob-St. Paul Police Department Training Unit.

MN POST Credits: 640

Required Equipment and Cost:

The cost for the class is $5,000 plus equipment (approximately $2,200). An equipment list will be provided upon acceptance to the class. By December of 2021, students should be in possession of their K9 partner and have ordered all required equipment for the class.  Students will meet periodically with training staff prior to the start of class on February 7^th, 2022.

Dog Selection and Purchasing:

The St Paul Police Canine Unit Training Staff can assist you with the selection, purchase, and delivery of your agency’s police canine. We have provided this service for agencies and there is no additional cost. The cost of a police canine varies, but you can expect a range from $10,000-$10,750. 

Additional Benefits:

 We provide a one-day canine seminar covering the management and supervision of a canine unit or canine team for supervisors or administrators of students attending the school. 

Students are invited back the following year for a week of additional training to prepare for the USPCA PD1 certification trials.   The supervisor class and PD1 training refresher are included with the cost of tuition.

Graduates of the course may also board their K9 partners at the SPPD kennels, for a fee, for the life of the dog. This provides a safer alternative to commercial kennels who may not be able to properly care for a police canine.  

To Apply:

Interested officers must send a letter requesting admission to the 2022 Saint Paul Police K9 Basic and Detector School to Chief Todd Axtell, 367 Grove Street, St. Paul, Minnesota 55101 or ChiefToddAxtell@ci.stpaul.mn.us. Questions about the canine school can be directed to the Canine Unit Commander Paul Ford at paul.ford@ci.stpaul.mn.us or 651-266-5533.