River Bend Pet Center Opens Dog Park, Honors Deceased K9 Officer Reign

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Brandy Fay, owner of River Bend Pet Center in Chehalis, said she couldn’t imagine a better animal to name her center’s dog park after.

“This time last year, Reign passed away,” Fay said. “It was exactly a year ago today. I didn’t know what to do. I felt completely helpless like you do after somebody loses a loved one and Reign just meant a lot to his handler.”

At the opening ceremony of the new dog park on Wednesday afternoon, Fay dedicated the park to Reign.

Reign, a Chehalis Police Department K9,  died last year after a sudden, unexpected and unexplained medical event. He was a roughly five-year-old Belgian malinois who had been on active duty with the Chehalis Police Department handler Warren Ayers since 2013.

“I knew Reign since the department got him,” Fay said. “One of the things I always admired about officer Ayers is, when he had questions about stuff, he would immediately get ahold of me. I probably heard from him on average one or two times a month. That’s how good he took care of that dog — he took such good care of him.”

Fay said the park is about five and a half acres and already has 50 members. River Bend Pet Center opened up boarding in December 2017, training and daycare in January and added full-time vet services on June 1. Fay said she will continue to add services as customers request them.

“I really have enjoyed working with the officers and appreciate their love for the animals and their partners, basically,” Fay said. “It’s a joy for me as a veterinarian to be able to give back to my community and this is yet another way to give back. I teach First Aid, CPR, I do the western Washington K9 units.”

Fay donates everything, including services, time and surgeries to the officers and departments.

She has done this for the last six years and works with about 10 teams from all over Lewis and Thurston counties.

A few weeks after Reign passed last year, Fay contacted Ayers about dedicating the dog park to his former partner.

“He was a free-spirited dog,” Ayers said. “(He was) just really down to earth, liked everybody, was happy, was never aggressive, never a vicious police dog. He and my son grew up together. (He was a) great PR dog, loved to go to schools. The day that he died, I let him out and let a couple kids play with him just after we got done eating lunch.”

Reign stayed in the house with Ayers and his family. He went everywhere with them, including family vacations. Ayers said he was both a police dog and a family dog.

“Reign was kind of both,” Ayers said. “He had this switch. Whenever I came home and I took his stuff off, the switch was turned off, so to speak, and he was as gentle as could be. He was just a regular dog. And then when you turned that switch on, it was on to working. It was really incredible — just turning the switch on and off.”

Centralia Police K9 unit officer Ruben Ramirez also attended the opening ceremony. He spoke of first meeting Reign.

“I knew Chehalis had been looking for a dog,” Ramirez said. “Warren came to me and was asking about how to start a program again. He got that all done and he was in the process of finding a dog.”

Ramirez traveled with Ayers to pick up Reign.

“We all drove together to California to find a dog for Warren,” Ramirez said. “When we got down there, we saw lots of dogs and didn’t really like any of the ones we saw at first. The guy that was running the facility there said ‘well, we have some other dogs, but they’re somewhere else at another facility.’”

The man who ran the facility told them there was one particular dog they may be interested in — Reign.

“We went to look at him,” Ramirez said. “It’s one of those things where you hear people say you choose a dog or select a dog. Well, it was obvious that the dog selected Warren. He went into that area where the dog was at and he (Reign) just came running right up to Warren. I think Warren at that point was like ‘yeah, I want this dog.’”

Ramirez’ long-time K9  partner, Lobo, retired due to medical reasons last year. Ramirez and Ayers have since received new dogs who were certified at the beginning of this year. 

Ramirez said Reign and Warren were one and the same.

“He (Reign) was really social, big heart, kind of like Warren, if you think about the two,” Ramirez said. “He’s just a big guy, but he’s just got a big heart and I think that Reign was the same way.”