Hamilton's cavalry is coming - Police unveil city's first mounted unit at festival today

These horses are big -- really big -- and Hamilton police hope they will make a big difference in making the downtown feel -- and be -- safer.

No one outside the police service knows the names of the four black Percheron breed horses brought in from an Indiana farm in January.

After 15 weeks of intense training in Toronto that included crowd management and sensory distractions, they and their names will be unveiled around noon today during the Police in the Park Festival at Bayfront Park.

The three-year pilot project, at $72,000 plus $10,000 operational costs each year, will mark the first time the service has had a mounted unit. So the unveiling has been planned with much fanfare.

The big, black animals will be presented with badges and their names unveiled before a group of Hamilton school kids who won a contest to name three horses, said Sergeant Marty Schulenberg, commander of the unit.

Three of the horses are named by kids from six different schools (some of the winning names were repeat submission) and the fourth was named in a police competition.

The horses are 17 hands (173 centimetres) tall from the ground to their neck and weigh upwards of 700 kilograms. All are males; two are four years old and the other two are six.

The unit's intention is to be a highly visible patrol unit, mostly in the downtown, he said.

"Police are often confined to being reactive but (the mounted unit) has the possibility of crime prevention," said Schulenberg, adding people are welcome to walk up to officers and chat about any problems in their community.

The unit will work with the new Addressing Crime Trends in our Neighbourhoods (ACTION) Team.