(Image Credit: CFJC Today / Kent Simmonds)

By Dylana Milobar

SEARCH AND RESCUE

New non-profit in place to train working dogs from future KSAR base

Aug 30, 2019 | 10:13 AM

KAMLOOPS — Earlier this spring, the Cooper Family announced recipients of the $40 million Wings Above Kamloops investment — including the BC Search Dog Association. However, after the association declined the gift, a new non-profit has been named as the recipient.

Now, Search, Rescue Detection (SRD) K9s of BC, led by Mike Ritcey, will encompass all working canines once the new search and rescue facility in Kamloops is built.

Cooper Family Foundation CEO Nelly Dever says, as part of the nearly 13,000 square foot development for the new search and rescue base, the SRD K9 centre will be able to service the province.

“They have over 3,500 square feet of just training (space). And then all of the hallways of the facility are anywhere between 5 to 7 feet wide. And it’s massive. So they basically have a running track around the facility.”

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Alongside plans for a regional command centre, head of SRD K9s, Mike Ritcey, says the service dog training will be a welcome part of a growing search and rescue force in the Kamloops area.

“Our main focus right now is going to be search dogs. We have no civilian search dogs north of Kamloops in the province. And hopefully with this new facility we’ll be able to bring trainers in, and people who want to train their dogs to become search dogs. It’s really exciting. It’s going to benefit the whole province.”

(Image Credit: CFJC Today / Kent Simmonds)

Once it is built, Ritcey says the organization hopes to have training in place for working dogs in all sorts of fields — including detection.

“For these dogs, this would be a perfect place to train. It’s going to be such a nice area, we hope to bring the RCMP in, and they can train their dogs because they have explosives dogs, and drug dogs.”

Boosted by nearly $1 million raised through donations, and home sales of the Catalpa Community development, Dever says about a quarter of the $40 million the Cooper family invested in the North Shore will go towards the Cooper Centre; which includes the new Search and Rescue facility, a daycare, and Tim Horton’s.

“Everything is on schedule, all plans have been moving forward,” she says. “We’re just a couple of weeks short of actually going to the city with a building permit, and we’re hoping that we’re going to start construction in early winter, and sometime around this time next year, we’re going to be talking about a ribbon cutting event.”