Issue 2 'unintended consequence' relates to marijuana-trained police K9s

PARMA, Ohio -- The recent voter-passed Issue 2, which went into effect last week, legalizes the use of marijuana for recreational purposes.

It also is a game changer for local law enforcement, beginning with the use of police K9s trained (or imprinted) to detect the odor of marijuana.

That’s why state Rep. Sean Brennan, a Parma Democrat, recently proposed a bill in the Ohio House of Representatives that will reimburse communities for police K9s that have been rendered nearly unusable due to the passage of Issue 2.

“The dogs are typically imprinted with multiple narcotics,” Brennan said. “The issue is, when a police dog hits on narcotics, they can’t bark once for marijuana and twice for heroin and three times for fentanyl.

“Because marijuana is legal now, those dogs are not going to be used to determine probable cause in these cases. So it’s an unintended consequence of Issue 2.”

The bipartisan bill, which has Sylvania Republican Josh Williams as joint sponsor, would allow local police departments to apply for grants to replace their affected canines, which after training and equipment can cost between $18,000 and $20,000 each.

If passed, the proposed $6 million bill paid out of the State of Ohio’s general revenue fund would later be reimbursed from tax revenues generated by the sale of legal cannabis.

“My bill allows communities that collectively have 298 dogs imprinted with marijuana to apply for one-time grants,” said Brennan.

He was contacted after the passage of Issue 2 by Parma Law Director Timothy Dobeck, Police Chief Joseph Bobak and Parma Police Department Canine Director Sgt. Bobby Jackson about the police K9 issue.

“Three of our five dogs are imprinted with marijuana, so we can no longer use them for narcotics search,” Bobak said.

“This severely limits their use to area search. We’re still assessing K9 replacement and budget impact if we cannot get state reimbursement.”

Brennan expects the bill, which now has roughly half a dozen co-sponsors, to be assigned to a committee for deliberation early next year.

The soonest it would be passed by the Ohio House and Senate would be mid-spring.

However, Brennan said the expected high demand for new police K9s means many departments won’t receive their new four-legged officers until late 2024 or, more than likely, 2025.

“I appreciate State Rep. Brennan introducing legislation relative to our K9s, as they are important to the work our department does each and every day,” Parma Mayor Tim DeGeeter said.

“Additionally, as a city, we will continue to see what other policy decisions will be made relative to Issue 2 by the state legislature.”

The police K9 issue isn’t the only change for law enforcement related to the passage of Issue 2.“Ohio cities face a host of issues, including human resource policies on marijuana use (pre- and post-employment), law enforcement and firefighter policies, federal law conflicts and grant requirements, zoning limitations and other issues,” Parma Safety Director Bob Coury said.

“We began studying the impacts and best practices in other states even before passage. We are doing our research, with the knowledge that the Ohio ballot language won’t be the final word on the law.”