Photo courtesy of Eric Wallen Winners of a coloring contest to name the Lyon County Sheriff’s new K9 got to meet the German shepherd and Deputy Beau Swenson on Saturday.

MARSHALL — The new K9 at the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office has a name, picked with the help of area kids. Eight winners of a coloring contest got to meet the K9 on Saturday, and after deliberating, chose the name Roxxy.

Roxxy and her handler, Deputy Beau Swenson, are currently spending weekdays in Buffalo as they complete a 12-week training course, said Sheriff Eric Wallen.

More than 200 children in fourth grade and under entered a coloring contest for a chance to help name the new K9.

“I never thought we would’ve had 268 entries at the end of the day,” Wallen said.

The Sheriff’s Office shared the names of the eight contest winners on social media on Monday. Shay Huso, Aidric Olson, Aliyah Brunsvold, Hazel Kimball, Leo Daniels, Laura Kor, Natalie Sandgren and Lydia Brusven were chosen to help pick a name for the dog.

Wallen said staff in the Sheriff’s Office came up with some ideas for names to help get the selection process started on Saturday.

“We used some of those (names) as options, and when we met with the kids, they proposed their options,” he said. They ended up with a list of about 15 names to pick from, including suggestions like Arrow, Ruby, Nora, Shadow and Pepper.

In the end, Roxxy was the favorite choice. The contest winners also got to meet Roxxy and Swenson.

Wallen said Roxxy is being trained as a “single-purpose” police dog, to detect substances like illegal drugs and to help find missing people. The Sheriff’s Office will utilize grant funding from opioid settlement funds for the new K9. The Sheriff’s Office is also accepting donations to help support the K9 program, Wallen said.