There will be a special guest riding in the Three Oaks Flag Day Parade this Sunday. It’s seven-year-old Kennedy Arney of St. Joseph, and she’ll be decked out in a police uniform and sworn in for the day as a Three Oaks police officer. Darlene Buller, the wife of Three Oaks Police Chief Dennis Buller, tells us she learned from Kennedy’s mother that the seven-year-old is one of the youngest in the nation to be diagnosed with juvenile ALS, a neurodegenerative disease. She also learned Kennedy has a dream of being a police officer. So, her husband arranged to have Kennedy sworn in.
“Kennedy is going to be wearing an actual police uniform that we had made for her, which our uniform maker donated, and she’s going to have a utility belt with handcuffs and that sort of thing on it,” Buller said. “Her assignment is going to be to ride in the parade.”
There will be a few other surprises for Kennedy on parade day. Buller says the Three Oaks Flag Day Parade is the biggest Flag Day parade in the country, now in its 66th year. It will be Sunday starting at 3 p.m., with the swearing in of the young girl as an honorary officer at 1:30. Full disclosure — Kennedy Arney is the daughter of WSJM’s Michael Arney.
