F
ire burns fast, fire runs hot, fire is deadly. You have less time
to react than you’d think. Large fires are becoming more
common, more homes are being lost, more lives are in danger,
cities and towns are being destroyed.
While exploring class project ideas, we learned that the elderly are at
greatest risk of perishing in a fire. According to FEMA, older adults (65
and up) suffered 35 percent of all fire deaths. Their risk of dying in a fire
was nearly times greater than that of the general population, and that
risk grew to 4.6 percent for those over the age of 84.
To our class, the safety of our community members was a project
goal of utmost importance. We were inspired by a previous class
project that involved the installation of life-saving automated external
defibrillators (AEDs) in local businesses.
We decided to work as a team to raise awareness of the importance
of smoke alarms and to increase fire safety in the homes of Gilroy’s
elderly. Then we came up with a name for our project: Tame the Flame.
According to the National Fire Protection Association, almost five
million U.S. households do not have working smoke alarms. Three out
of five home fire deaths occur in homes with no smoke alarms or no
working smoke alarms. The risk of dying in a home fire can be cut in
half when a household has a functioning alert system. Some home-
owners remove the alarm batteries after their alarm goes off randomly
in the middle of the night. But their alarms most likely went off because
they needed new batteries, or they were old (past the ten-year mark)
and needed to be replaced. Either way, too many homes are without
working smoke alarms and therefore are insufficiently protected in the
event of a fire.
Seniors are especially at risk because they typically don’t change
their batteries or alarms every ten years and often are too frail to install
them in the first place.
We chose to serve the residents of Gilroy’s Wagon Wheel senior
mobile home park by installing much-needed smoke and carbon
monoxide detecting alarms. The project has allowed us to work as a
team to raise community awareness of the importance of smoke alarms
and to increase fire safety in the homes of Gilroy’s elderly.
To ensure project success, we divided up into three sub-groups:
Fundraising, Community Outreach, and Installation. This made project
planning and communication much easier for all of us.
We faced a few challenges, but the biggest challenge was the
smoke alarm installation. Thankfully, the Gilroy Fire Department helped
us with the installations in late September.
While our project directly benefitted the residents of Wagon Wheel,
we members of the Leadership Gilroy Class of 2019 have had a
positive impact on the broader community through our outreach and
fundraising, which has allowed us to advocate for fire safety for every-
one, especially the elderly. We decided to dedicate any unused project
funds to providing fire safety kits for all of the residents of Wagon
Wheel, and beyond that, to other community members in need.
.
GILROY • MORGAN HILL • SAN MARTIN
FALL/HOLIDAY 2019
Class of 2019 at the Gilroy Fire Station.
Photo Page 94:
In Front of the State Capitol in Sacramento
Back Row: Jennifer Tomasello, Mike McMahon,
Jessica Ewing, Lisa Blagof, Josh Korbel, Jorge
DuranFront Row: Andrew Habing, Kanani Pratt,
Lillian Silva, Jenny Arrellano-Morales, Daysi
Quijada, Kelly Chavez, Roya Wallace, Sarah
Rosso-Bent, Amanda Rudeen, Paco Rodriguez,
Farank Mahdevi
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