Public safety officials give back for the holidays
Posted By: Camila Orti
Off-duty officers and firefighters are getting into the holiday spirit by giving back to the community.
For the first time this year, more than 40 off-duty Lincoln police officers met kids at Target Saturday morning for their Heroes and Helpers “shop with a cop” program. Officers paired up with 34 low-income kids to shop for Christmas gifts.
“I think they probably have a bigger impact on us than we do on them, so it’s been a lot of fun today,” LPD Sgt. Jeff Sorensen said.
The grade-schoolers were each given a $75 gift cards to spend on whatever they wanted. Turns out, a lot of them were also in the giving spirit.
“I got something for my mom but I can’t say it because my mom’s right here, and I got my brother a Nurf gun, my baby sister a toy,” 10-year-old Chandler Pfeifer said.
On the other side of town, Lincoln firefighters were doing their part, too. About a dozen volunteered their time to distribute food baskets to needy families.
“It’s just helping out the community and putting smiles on families’ faces,” organizer Bill Hershberger said.
The Lincoln Firefighters Benefit Association has been doing this since the sixties. This year, 18 families received $100 food baskets.
Ashley Bretthauer and her daughter were one of them. She says just feeding her family can be a struggle during the holidays.
“This time of year just seems to be that way, I don’t know why,” Bretthauer said, “but yeah I’m very thankful, this was definitely a big blessing.”
Both firefighters and police officers contributed out of pocket for these events. Some officers said their kids spent up to $50 more than their gift cards at Target, an expense they covered with their own money.
