The new South Covington Dog Park will officially be named after well-known late Covington Police K9 Ernie, who served on the force for nearly a decade.
Ernie is the namesake of a 2017 change in Kentucky law called “Ernie’s Law,” which made it a felony to assault a police dog.
The new dog park is slated to be located on a city-owned tract of land on Hands Pike. Park funding was set aside this year as part of the city’s annual budgeting process.
The idea of naming the park in Ernie’s honor was brought up during the latter parts of this week’s meeting of the Covington Board of Commissioners. Commissioner Tim Downing, who first pitched the idea of a dog park itself, recommended naming the park the “K9 Ernie Memorial Dog Park.”
The item did not appear on the meeting’s agenda, but the commissioners passed Downing’s motion unanimously.
Ernie began working for Covington PD in 2012, according to a city press release. He was shot twice in 2015 while pursuing a murder suspect but recovered. Ernie would later survive two car crashes while on the job, according to reporting from WCPO and WKRC. A crash Ernie survived in 2018 actually became the basis for the first person to be charged with a felony offense under Ernie’s law, making Ernie both the law’s namesake and its first beneficiary.
Ernie died in 2021 from cancer.
“I thought that naming this park in K9 Ernie’s honor will provide permanent recognition of his brave service to Covington,” said Downing this week.
