Seal Beach police dog brings community joy

SEAL BEACH, Calif. (KABC) -- In Seal Beach, Yosa the Police Facility Dog, is both a local celebrity and a community ambassador. We walked through town with Yosa and her handler, Captain Nick Nicholas. The sweet interactions with people in the community were endless. From adults to children of all sizes, everyone was drawn to her.

Yosa is nothing like traditional police K-9 dogs that are trained to search for evidence or take down suspects. She comes from a 50-year-old organization called Canine Companions, known for training *service dogs for people with disabilities.

"They have all the same skills, being able to assist with things like picking up items off the ground, opening doors, they're trained to be extremely calm, unflappable in high stress situations and able to interact with all sorts of different people," said Kyle Kensing from Canine Companions.

For Seal Beach Police, duties can go from greeting all the locals to comforting those who need it the most.

"Often we interact with the public on their worst days, either they're a victim of a crime or they've experienced some sort of trauma," said Captain Nick Nicholas. "So just the fact that we have Yosa available to be a resource to our community is so powerful and so moving. She just lifts the spirits of everyone she interacts with."

Canine Companions provides these facility dogs at no cost. They can be in law enforcement like Yosa is, or in the criminal justice system, healthcare or even education. For Seal Beach Police, it's an innovative community policing program - that works.

"As soon as I say, yea come over and see Yosa, it's an immediate deposit in that bank account of community trust and we get to interact and have a really positive, nice moment with a member of our community," said Captain Nicholas.

She is the town's most loving star with her own collectible cards, stickers, and challenge coins.