Supporting Beattyville Volunteer Fire Department
Donation protected
The Beattyville Volunteer Fire Department is a 100% volunteer fire department located in Beattyville, Kentucky. Beattyville is the county seat of Lee County, which is the 11th poorest county in the nation by median household income rankings, and has the 6th highest percent of people living in poverty in the state at 39.0%, per 2016 census data.
It costs tens of thousands of dollars to run a fire station efficiently and to provide adequate personal protective equipment (PPE - turnout gear allowing us to operate within fire conditions while lessening the risk to our volunteers) for the members that volunteer their free time to help provide an essential emergency service to our community. It costs roughly $3,000 per member just for their basic PPE, which ages out 10 years from manufacture date (or immediately after contamination). With the restrictions put into place in regard to the current pandemic our inability to hold fundraisers, coupled with a growing membership and members with PPE that will age out this year, we are using new fundraising streams, thus the creation of this GoFundMe campaign, to try to make ends meet.
All donations will go directly to funding equipment required for our organization to continue to provide fire suppression, motor vehicle extrication, rescue, EMS assist, cat-in-tree recovery (we do really have to do this from time to time), and a host of other services we provide to help protect our community.
Our members receive no compensation for their time and service, whether it be training, during operations at incidents, or working at the station to maintain the building, training/meeting area, equipment, and apparatuses. We are asking for help to make sure our members can provide the best possible emergency services while being able to maintain safety for themselves.
Thank you for your support,
Ben Andrews
Chief - Beattyville Volunteer Fire Department
It costs tens of thousands of dollars to run a fire station efficiently and to provide adequate personal protective equipment (PPE - turnout gear allowing us to operate within fire conditions while lessening the risk to our volunteers) for the members that volunteer their free time to help provide an essential emergency service to our community. It costs roughly $3,000 per member just for their basic PPE, which ages out 10 years from manufacture date (or immediately after contamination). With the restrictions put into place in regard to the current pandemic our inability to hold fundraisers, coupled with a growing membership and members with PPE that will age out this year, we are using new fundraising streams, thus the creation of this GoFundMe campaign, to try to make ends meet.
All donations will go directly to funding equipment required for our organization to continue to provide fire suppression, motor vehicle extrication, rescue, EMS assist, cat-in-tree recovery (we do really have to do this from time to time), and a host of other services we provide to help protect our community.
Our members receive no compensation for their time and service, whether it be training, during operations at incidents, or working at the station to maintain the building, training/meeting area, equipment, and apparatuses. We are asking for help to make sure our members can provide the best possible emergency services while being able to maintain safety for themselves.
Thank you for your support,
Ben Andrews
Chief - Beattyville Volunteer Fire Department
Organizer
Ben Andrews
Organizer
Beattyville, KY
