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Local Fire Fighters Donate Coats to Watauga County Children in Need During Festival on Saturday

Nov. 21, 2014. Fire fighters with the Boone Professional Fire Fighters Association will hand-deliver brand new, American-made coats to approximately 100 Boone and Watauga County children in need on Saturday afternoon. Quiet Givers is assisting Boone Professional Fire Fighters with the donations, and has arranged for children from Hospitality House, Watauga County Children’s Council, Western Youth Network and the Oasis School Social Program to receive new coats.

imgres-1The donations are a portion of more than 600 coats the Professional Fire Fighters and Paramedics of North Carolina purchased through Firefighter Coats for Kids and divided among several cities across North Carolina.

You are invited and encouraged to attend the afternoon that includes a coat donation, but also tons of activities for children and their families including Christmas ornament making, snacks, movies and other activities. The festival will be from 2-4 p.m. at the Mount Vernon Baptist Church gymnasium at 3505 Bamboo Rd. in Boone. Members of the Boone Town Council have also been invited to attend.

In addition to approximately 100 coats that the Boone Professional Fire Fighters have purchased, 50 more children will receive coats thanks to the Appalachian State Social Work Club. Additional funds will be on hand if any child cannot find a coat in his or her size.

“It’s significant to be able to see 150 kids without jackets receive jackets because the weather is so unpredictable in Boone and the winters are so harsh,” said Amber Bateman, executive director of Quiet GIvers, adding that most of the kids wait outside each morning for the school bus.

“The children served through this donation are in the greatest need and will benefit the most from a warm jacket,” Bateman said. “A lot of these kids have hand-me-downs that are torn and worm, and with the donation of a brand new jacket, they will get long use out of it.”

The Boone Professional Fire Fighters Association is an affiliate of the International Fire Fighters Association and the Professional Fire Fighters and Paramedics of North Carolina. PFFPNC and its statewide local associations are active participants in Firefighters Coats for Kids, an outreach foundation that provides never-worn, American-made coats for children in need.

Firefighters Coats for Kids is part of Operation Warm, a national nonprofit organization that addresses the need of children living in poverty in the United States with new coats. PFFPNC purchased 606 coats with money raised in city fundraising efforts. The coats will be divided among those cities, including Boone, High Point, Concord, Asheville, Statesville and Winston Salem.

Boone Professional Fire Fighters and PFFPNC support Firefighters Coats for Kids and Operation Warm because all donated coats are brand new, never worn or dry cleaned and made in America.