Council gets donations for K-9 unit
The Butler Bureau of Police’s K-9 unit received more than $1,000 from community businesses Thursday night, providing a financial bump to the donation-based program.
The Thompson-Miller Funeral Home gave $1,000 at Thursday’s meeting of Butler City Council, and Berkshire Hathaway gave $250 to the K-9 unit.
The K-9 unit is comprised of two police dogs, Rico and Chooch, and their handlers, Andres Niederlander and Brian Grooms. Prior to the meeting, Grooms said the unit recently paid some unexpected expenses, which led Butler business owner Denny Offstein to alert potential donors to the program.
Grooms said Wednesday that the vehicles the police department uses for the K-9 unit are its biggest regular expense, so the donations will help pay for their maintenance.
“The cars are outfitted specifically for the K-9s; they are in the cars 90% of the workday,” Grooms said. “We had to do some repairs over the summer so we could use more donations from people.”
Council also proclaimed Aug. 26 as Maj. Gen. Peter Talleri USMC Day. Talleri served in the Marine Corps for 34 years before retiring in 2013.
Talleri was recognized as Butler Hometown Hero at the Butler Area High School football game Friday night. At City Council, he said the honor was one of the proudest he has received.
“I have gotten awards from other places and other countries, but for your hometown to recognize you for a job well done is something that I take in my heart to my grave,” Talleri said.
Council is looking to buy a dump truck for its streets department to allow the city to do some paving on its own rather than having all of its jobs bid out on contracts. It will be paid for with the city’s Liquid Fuels Fund.
Councilman Fred Reese said council is open to purchasing a new or used dump truck that can carry seven tons. He also said the city does not have a set dollar amount in mind yet for its purchase.
“We’re looking for a seven-ton dump truck to do paving,” Reese said. “All our paving right now is contracted out, our dump trucks we have are only five tons, and they can’t get enough asphalt to feed the machine constantly.”
Council also approved preliminary designs for signage for the Rotary Cultural District planned to be developed downtown.
Butler Mayor Bob Dandoy said the city is working in tandem with the framers of the cultural district to implement signage and designs. He said the city’s involvement will allow council to add signs of the same design to the cultural district.
“When they came and said, ‘Here is where we want to put the signs,’ and we said, ‘We would like one here with directional markings to the farmers market,’ we could go ahead and add one of that same design,” Dandoy said.
Dandoy also said there is still “a lot of work to do” before the cultural district comes to fruition.
Council also accepted an Assistance to Firefighters Grant for $27,515, which will be used to buy two thermal-imaging cameras, two automated external defibrillators and a rapid intervention team pack with an air cylinder. This year’s grant provides a total of $26,204 and the city’s match is $1,310.
Butler Bureau of Fire chief Chris Switala said the department has applied for this grant several times, for as much as $72,000. He said the equipment being bought this round will equip all of the department’s trucks with thermal-imaging cameras, AEDs and the defibrillators, which will each be used in rescue situations.
“(Thermal-imaging cameras) detect temperature and produce an image based on temperature so they are used to spot victims in a smoke-filled environment,” Switala said. “(The defibrillator) is specifically designed if a firefighter has a problem with their air pack, this provides emergency breathing air that a rescue team can get to supply that firefighter until we can get them extricated.”
