South Fayette opens contest to name new police bloodhound

Photo courtesy of South Fayette Township
Photo courtesy of South Fayette Township
Police Sgt. Mike Wesolek with the police department’s new bloodhound.
Starting in 2018, the South Fayette Police Department will welcome a new member of its team.
She’s known for her sense of smell, her human tracking ability and her tendency to eat homework.
Well, maybe not that last one, but township police Chief John Phoennik said the department’s new bloodhound dog is going to help officers solve cases, find missing persons and further community-oriented policing initiative.
“The dog is going to do what it naturally does, which is track people,” Phoennik said. “It’s not a ‘K-9.’ It’s not going to be used for drugs. It’s going to be used for scent tracking, whether that’s a runaway, someone with dementia, a special needs person or a suspect. We’ll use the dog to track, and that’s it.”
The township is hosting a naming contest on its website. The form is open until 9 a.m. on Monday, Dec. 11.
The township requests name submissions are one or two syllables, as that is what will be easiest for a female bloodhound to learn. After the entries are submitted, Sgt. Mike Wesolek, the dog’s handler, will choose the winning name. The dog will be officially introduced during the township’s Dec. 13 commissioners meeting, and the winner will have his or her photo taken with the dog for South Fayette Connect magazine.
“I don’t know how many submissions we have now, but I know that we had almost 300 name submittals in the first 36 hours,” Phoennik said.

South Fayette is hosting a contest to name its new police bloodhound.
Phoennik said the bloodhound, which is known for scent-tracking, fits the South Fayette community better than a traditional German shepherd.
“There’s a lot of K-9, German shepherds around here,” Phoennik said. “This will fill that niche, it fills the needs of the community. We have assisted living, Country Meadows, several children with special needs schools. We’ve had a couple incidents over the last several years where somebody had run off, whether it was a special needs child or it was somebody who was court committed or a dementia patient who got lost or ran away.”
Phoennik said a bloodhound was chosen because they have more sensitive noses – up to 1,000 times more sensitive, according to Phoennik – and because they wouldn’t need to keep the dog from interacting with the public, as she will serve as a community relations tool.
“Most of the times it’s going to go out in the community, in the schools, at community day,” Phoennik said. “It’s going to be doing community-oriented PR work kind of stuff when it’s not tracking. I’ve always been a big believer in the community-policing aspect, so I just want to make sure it’s another PR positive as well as a positive for the community.”
To enter a submission, visit southfayettepa.org.