The City Council of Vandalia, Ohio, met on September 3, 2024, at 7:00 PM. The meeting included a proclamation for National Service Dog Awareness Month, a presentation from the Dayton Metro Library, the swearing-in of two new police officers, and votes on several resolutions and ordinances. Notable actions included approval of water main replacement grant applications, a subdivision plan, EV charging station rates, a zoning amendment prohibiting adult-use marijuana, emergency appropriations, and a conditional use for a truck facility.
September 3rd, 2024, City of Andaya Council meeting is now called to order. We'll start with a moment of reflection, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag. Please stand for the pledge. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. All right, Council, you've had an opportunity to review the council study session minutes and the council meeting minutes of August 19th. Are there any comments or corrections? Being none, they stand approved, and that brings us to communications petitions and awards. And at this time, we have a proclamation for National Service Dog Awareness Month. So at this time, I would like to invite uh Donna Sword and her group up to the podium for the presentation. Yep. Yasmine. Yasmin. Yasmin. Yasmin's the first old guy right here. Well, I think over the the last well, probably 10 years, service dogs have become more and more important in our society. I know you know it's estimated that right now that there's 60 more 64 million adults and children in this country right now that would qualify for the use of a service dog. However, the biggest problem we've got, there's only 16 million of them that are accredited to be a service dog. So we do aware that we are aware that it is vital, and it's something that's really needed. You guys do to help bring awareness to it. And that's why City Council and uh myself would like to present this proclamation to you today. We are going to proclaim that September, all month of September, 2024. This National Service Dog month here in the city of Vandalia. Here's the proclamation make your time. I do. I'd like to take just a couple minutes, please. So I'm here tonight with uh my name's Donna Sword. I'm here with my husband Don and uh our friends Jerry and Jerry Amos. We are all volunteer puppy raisers for K9 Companions, a service dog organization. Um actually this Thursday, Don and I are going to celebrate our 16th year as volunteer puppy raisers for K9 Companions. This puppy we have with us tonight, Ms. Jasmine, is our 11th puppy that we've raised. And with that, we are uh just beginners in this because the Amos have uh raised 224 service dogs. Um I also serve on our leadership team for our Cincinnati Dayton chapter of Canine Companions, and we do a lot of outreach events and opportunities to spread awareness of what service dogs can do, how they can help mitigate disabilities and make a positive impact in people's lives. I am absolutely honored to be here tonight and to receive this proclamation, and I thank the City of Andalia for this. Umpanions is a nonprofit organization headquartered in Santa Rosa, California. We have seven regional centers across the country where we train service dogs. We have paid staff that do that. Um we provide task-trained service dogs to adults, children, and veterans with disabilities, as well as facility dogs to professionals working in health care, criminal justice, rehabilitation, educational settings. K9 Companion puppies are especially bred, raised, and trained for future careers. So K9 Companions created the concept of service dogs in 1975. We are the largest and the oldest service dog organization in the U.S. We serve people uh with more than 65 different types of disabilities, and we right now we have more than 2800 active teams throughout the country, and last month we reached the milestone of placing our 8,000 8,000 dog service dog. We currently have more than 400 people on our wait list. The service dog need is so great. Um as mentioned of the 64 million people, Americans living with a disability, only a small fraction, about 16,000, um, benefit from the assistance of task trained service dogs. So that's less than one percent of the people with disabilities that could have a service dog that would qualify that actually have one. So National Service Dog Month, celebrated every September, shines a light on the invaluable impact service dogs have on the lives of people with disabilities. So we believe it's important that our community understands the benefit of task train service dogs, and we and this proclamation will help raise awareness of the rights of service dog users, including Keenan Companions clients. So again, we are honored and we thank you.