ENERGY, Ill. -- Tax revenue from cannabis sales were donated to a local police department to bring in a new K9 officer to the force.
The Williamson County Board of Commissioners held a meeting and approved tax revenue from cannabis sales to be invested back into the Energy Police Department for a new trained K9 officer on Wednesday.
This will help the Energy Police Department fill a spot left vacant from a recent retired K9 unit.
The funds are required to be used for drug interdiction purposes.
In the meeting, $7500 was donated to the Energy Police Department to help with the purchase of the new K9 and to have them trained with their officer.
The Energy K9 unit is solely funded by donations from the community, now supplemented by these new funds.
"The main thing for us in Energy, and for me personally, is that for a small town, this is a big project. I mean the expenses, the purchase of the dog, the purchase of the car, the training, they add up very quickly and to be able to say that we're not spending any of our taxpayers money on that, but yet we're providing the benefit is just something that we're extremely excited about," Energy Police Chief Shawn Ladd said.
Williamson County Sheriff Jeff Diedrich and States Attorney Ted Hampson were also in attendance to show support for the motion.
