GLADSTONE – Local businesses are coming together to raise money for man’s best friend.

The Dewdrop Family Restaurant and D&D Dog Dynamics are joining forces to raise money for Bico, the Gladstone Public Safety K-9. The fundraiser takes place at the Dew Drop restaurant on Saturday, June 29 starting at 4:30 p.m. This annual event is in year five and aims to raise money for Bico and his needs. Owner of the Dewdrop, Amanda Phillips, said she was approached when she first opened the restaurant in 2018 and it’s been a yearly event since.

“We just decided that this is something that we would like to support and do every single year for the public safety K9,” Phillips said.

The pup of the hour, Bico will be in attendance as well as Nuke, a K9 from D&D Dynamics.

“The two of them together are gonna do a demo to show some of what a K9 can do, a lot of times they do a drug search on a vehicle and they’ll do a bite demonstration,” Phillips said.

In addition to live demonstrations, attendees can enter a basket raffle provided by local businesses in the community. There will be two tables for the raffle baskets, one table is $5 per ticket and the other table, which has higher priced items is $10 per ticket. For the $5 ticket, there is a deal where attendees can buy five tickets for $20. The tickets will be available through July 26, so if you can’t make the event you can still participate in the raffle.

After the event, there will be a meet and great with Bico as well as his handler, Officer Dylan Enright, and Nuke.

The festivities don’t end there as there will be live music performed by the Reflections Band from 6 to 9 p.m.

All proceeds from the event will go directly to Gladstone Public Safety for anything Bico may need such as medicine, food, toys, equipment and more. Phillips said she will even donate a percentage of the sales made by Dewdrop that day.

Weather permitting, the event is slated to be held behind the Dewdrop building. Should it rain, the event will be moved across the street to the D&D Dynamics facility.

The Dewdrop Family restaurant is located at 916 Delta Avenue in Gladstone.