The Hobart Lawrence Police Department added K-9 Partner Bax to the team in 2016. The first K-9 Officer program in Hobart Lawrence was made possible by an extremely generous donation from a local Hobart family.

Officer Tremel and his K-9 Partner Bax underwent six weeks of training Albuquerque, New Mexico before being able to work the field. Officer Tremel and Officer Bax were trained and tested on many different areas including: obedience, agility, tracking, wind scenting, area searches, building searches, evidence recovery, tactical operations, handler protection and narcotic detection.

Officer Bax is a dual purpose K-9, meaning that he is capable of working as a patrol dog and as a detection dog respectfully. Patrol dogs work efforts consist of tracking suspects or missing persons, conducting building searches for suspects, area (wind) searches for suspects, evidence searches, apprehension of resisting suspects, and handler protection. As a second purpose, Officer Bax is also trained in the detection of drugs.

Hobart Lawrence Police Department needs your support to help fund our new K-9 Program. The K-9 program is funded solely through donations from the public. All costs of the program (with the exception of personnel) are paid for through the generosity of individual citizens, groups and local business owners in our community. We are asking for donations to help pay for the dog's ongoing training, veterinary bills, daily food, and equipment. Your donation to this program will go directly to this effort and is tax deductible under Section 170 ( c) (1) of the Internal Revenue Code (instrumentality of a governmental unit).