Report: Army adopted out aggressive bomb-sniffing dogs to families with young children
The article itself, describes only a single incident of a dog "snapping at a child." The most severe consequences seem to be what happened to the dogs.www.armytimes.com wrote:According to a Defense Department inspector general report released March 1, as the program lacked appropriate oversight and organization in general, and in particular lacked appropriate procedures for re-homing the dogs when the program ended.
They couldn't even get the number of dogs involved correct: "But according to a report provided to the House Armed Services Committee, that number was 229."www.armytimes.com wrote:The Army had 232 dogs to get rid of by mid-February 2015, the IG report found, a mix of Belgian Tervuren, Belgian Malinois, Dutch shepherd, German shepherd, German short-haired pointer, golden retriever, Labrador retriever and pit bulls.
Among the disorganization:
* A last minute decision to open the dogs to be adopted by private citizens led to almost no evaluation of the dog, or who the dog went to.
* Army veterinarians were unable to keep up with neutering of all the dogs that went to private citizens.
* Most of the dogs that went to law enforcement washed out of their respective programs.
* 13 dogs went to a private company that subsequently abandoned them.
Keep in mind that this is a report of events from 4 years ago, and according to the article things have changed.
Any thoughts on this?In the years since the end of the TEDD program, the Army and DoD had already made strides toward improving disposition procedures for working dogs. For instance, in 2015, it became policy to first offer adoption to former handlers.
And in response to the IG’s recommendations, the Army has been updating its working dog regulation to make sure it complies with DoD standards. The revised regulation is due in March and scheduled to be published in November, according to the IG report.