According to a WearTV article, many drug sniffing K-9’s may be out of work if recreational marijuana becomes legal in Florida.
Florida’s State Supreme Court is now reviewing a proposed constitutional amendment for next year’s ballot to legalize the drug recreationally.
According to a poll last month by the ‘University of North Florida’, a staggering 64% of voters approved the idea.
Sheriff Bob Johnson said his force is already preparing for what may happen to drug sniffing K-9’s.
“I spend more time with him than I do my family,” said Deputy Christopher Mann. The Deputy and the dog, named Zeus, have been working together for almost four years.
Zeus is one of eight K-9s at the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office trained to sniff out drugs.
“Zeus is trained in the narcotics portion. He’s trained in both marijuana, cocaine, crack cocaine, heroin, and meth,” said Deputy Mann.
“They’ve gotten just about every kind of drug off the streets,” said Sheriff Johnson.
“Dogs alert on five scents and marijuana is one of them. If marijuana is legal we start using our dogs after it becomes legal – they could be alerting on marijuana,” said Sheriff Johnson.
According to Johnson, it costs the department about $15,000 to buy and train each dog.
K-9s trained like Zeus could still work at the county’s schools or jail, but Sheriff Johnson believes they would probably retire.
“I sell them back to the handler for $1 and the dog stays with the handler to lay around the house and retire,” said Sheriff Johnson.
