The Athens County Sheriff’s Office added a new member to their team: Bara the K-9.
Bara is a service dog donated to the county sheriff’s office by The Blue Line Foundation, an organization that provides law enforcement with resources to better their communities.
Community Relations Deputy Jayson White, who is also the school resource officer in Athens, is Bara’s partner. He said The Blue Line Foundation first reached out to him in early 2025 to see what they could do to help Athens.
“Since I started this particular job five years ago, every school that I go to or every building I walk in, whenever I see kids, the first thing I always hear is, ‘Where's your dog?’ (or) ‘You should get a dog,’” White said.
Before White met Bara, the two-year-old service dog had already started training at Circle Tail, a non-profit organization based in Cincinnati, that trains and pairs service and facility dogs with potential owners.
Jen Kiblinger, the president of Circle Tail, had the opportunity to be Bara’s foster owner while he was going through training. She said Bara came to Circle Tail from another service dog school when he was about eight weeks old.
Kiblinger said the program takes two to three years to complete, depending on the maturity level of the dog. During training, the dogs cycle through three locations: Circle Tail’s kennel, a foster home and a prison.
At first, the dogs start learning basic manners and skills. The dogs are introduced to environments they might be in while training.
“A lot of it is just building confidence and sociability (in) new sorts of environments we have, like play equipment in the play rooms … just stuff that can kind of be intimidating for some dogs,” Kiblinger said. “We want them to kind of be used to seeing different things and walking over different surfaces.”
As the dog transitions to a foster home, new skills are applied to real world scenarios.
“I fostered Bara, so I took him to my office, and I would take him to any errands I would run,” Kiblinger said. “They learn how to behave in public, behave around people (and) behave around other dogs.”
In the prisons, the inmates learn how to train the dogs through the Inmate and Canine Educational Training Prison Program. Circle Tail works with two prisons in Ohio: the Ohio Reformatory for Women and the Dayton Correctional Institute.
As the dogs mature, trainers determine which route is best suited to each dog. Circle Tail trains service and hearing dogs for mobility assistance, seizure response, type one diabetes and hearing loss. Facility dogs are trained for schools and care facilities.
“We look for, ‘Where is this dog going to be happiest?’” Kiblinger said. “‘What career is best for this dog?’ For Bara, I was like, ‘Yeah, he's a facility dog.’”
Part of Bara’s routine is visiting multiple schools everyday. According to the County Sheriff department’s Instagram, Bara’s top priority is to “spread comfort, calm and smiles wherever he goes.”
White said all Athens County school districts are part of their rotation.
"I'm in and out of the schools as needed,” White said. “If I'm called to a crime committed at whatever school, I go and help out with those situations, so he tags along with me. But now it's not just crimes that are committed at schools; now we just do walk-throughs at schools. Say, maybe not a crime was committed, but there's a really upset kid in an office … dogs will calm situations down very, very efficiently.”
Morgan Dilbone, an Ohio University junior studying music production, said she does not remember a K-9 ever coming into her former school, though her guidance counselor occasionally brought in her own dog.
“I think (a dog) could bring a sense of familiarity,” Dilbone said. “I feel like a lot of people have dogs and … because I know police and law enforcement can be a little stressful at times, I think maybe bringing an animal would help calm people down.”
Not only is Bara’s role to deescalate high stress situations, but he is also White’s new right hand.
“I like to make people happy,” White said. “I got in this to make people's day better. 99% of the time we show up at a call, people aren't happy that the cops are there … But when I leave, I improved the situation a little bit. So, Bara is like the golden ticket to doing that everywhere. Who doesn't smile when they see a dog walking down the street?”
When the duo visit schools, White said students crowd around to see Bara; they sometimes even follow them down the hallway.
“More kids already know his name than my name,” White said. “I've been doing this for five years; he's been here for a month.”
Bara’s personality is another aspect that makes him great for the job.
“He has just always been an exuberant dog, just a very happy guy,” Kiblinger said.
Bara’s personality is part of what makes him the right dog for the job when it comes to working in schools.
“He is the gentlest, sweetest dog ever,” White said. “Even when you try to wrestle with a dog, it will play bite. You can't even instigate him to do that. He does not want to put his mouth on anybody. He would not harm a fly. I don't even think he wants to hurt his food when he eats it, because he's so gentle taking food.”
White said on a visit to Beacon School, Bara really moved him.
“There's this one young lady that was paraplegic (and) immobile,” White said. “Without me even having to say anything, (Bara) just went and laid down next to her. The sweetest thing in the world. I almost got choked up watching. I was like, ‘This dog's perfect. How did he already know how to do that?’… Everybody else in the room was, I think, hit by that too.”
The County Sheriff’s Instagram account stated Bara was officially sworn in early January. Bara is having an impact on students already, bringing joy to their days and smiles to their faces.
“(Dogs) are not all here to sniff bombs or guns or drugs or bite people or anything like that,” White said. “They're just (here to) make people happy, to make someone's day a little bit better.”
