Gabriel Anderson of Boy Scout Troop 444 in Fountain Hills is organizing a metal recycling drive as a fundraiser for his Eagle Project to benefit the Maricopa K9 Search and Rescue team.

MARK9 is a volunteer, non-profit team that provides specialized canine services to law enforcement agencies throughout Arizona to search out lost hikers and other missing persons such as dementia patients.

“I saw how hard the posse members worked to train their dogs and I wanted to help. Saving lives is important,” Gabriel explained.

The 20-plus team members at MARK9 spend countless hours fine tuning their dogs’ keen sense of smell to track missing persons through a variety of scenarios.

This is an “on-call” volunteer unit where team members receive no compensation for their extensive time, equipment and training tools.

Gabriel wanted to do something to help.

By creating portable training equipment for the team to share, Gabriel hopes to assist all the current members as well as future MARK9 members.

Gabriel wants to thank several local organizations that have donated materials, tools or services to benefit his project including CRF Construction, Chad of All Trades, SET Enterprises, Little Caesar’s Pizza, Home Depot and BSA Troop 444.

One can help by donating recyclable metal such as pop cans, old appliances or scrap metal.

Money raised from the metal recycling will be used for the materials needed to create training tools for MARK9.

If you would like to make a contribution toward this Eagle Scout project, call Gabriel Anderson at 480-209-0196 before May 26 to arrange a pick-up of your recyclable metal.