Medfield State Hospital Property usage...

The following information is from the Master Plan Communications Committee.

Medfield State Hospital Master Plan Committee Update

The Medfield State Hospital Master Plan Committee has been looking at passive uses of the property – ones that don’t involve building or expenditures. Many of us already have found a use, for example, taking a walk. Other activities include one recently seen – Massachusetts State Police Canine Training.

State Police Canine Training Trooper Jason Vital kindly answered all of the interviewer’s questions and explained the Canine Basic Patrol School. The school provides the dogs with two skills, patrolling and scent detection. The scent detection is used for identifying such items as narcotics, people and firearms. They are trained to track an odor trail: locate and identify the odor, and follow it to its source. Tracking an odor trail can be used for crimes, wandering patients, lost children, etc.

The MSH property is an ideal location for the canine training. It provides a good mix of hard and soft surfaces and mimics a general environment in the real world. The soft surfaces don’t hold an odor the same as the hard surfaces. The property provides less distractions which make training easier. As was observed, an odor trail was left for the dog to track and an item with the scent was introduced to the dog. The dog then led his handler along the scent trail.

Training of these work driven canines consists of obedience, tactical obedience, building searches, article recovery, tracking and apprehension. Four dogs are in the Canine Basic Patrol School. They range in age from 12 months to 5-1/2 years of age. There are three varieties of Shepherds; German, Dutch and Belgian Malinois. After 15 weeks of school training the dogs have 8 weeks of scent training. They are then Certification tested to NESPAC (New England State Police Administrators Conference) Standards including their handlers who need to recognize what the dog is telling them. After this foundation training the dogs then have weekly maintenance training.

The dogs and their trainers have been at the property a couple of times this spring. This is another great example of a passive use of the land.