By JEFF STITT
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Walking into Clancy’s Pub on Sunday, guests couldn’t help but notice a sea of people wearing shirts that said “This T-shirt helped keep a police officer safe.”
Those patrons were at the Dravosburg bar for Tips for Kids, a program in which McKeesport Area School District teachers and board members join with the Mc-Keesport Fire Department to raise money for two programs that firefighter Rob Patterson and school board President Joe Lopretto came up a few years ago: The McKeesport Coats for Kids program and the Protecting Our Police initiative.
Through the McKeesport Coats for Kids program, members of McKeesport International Association of Firefighters Local 10 purchase a brand new winter coat for every student at Twin Rivers Elementary School and for the students in pre-kindergarten and kindergarten at Francis McClure Elementary School.
In the Protecting Our Police initiative, firefighters purchase bullet-proof vests for McKeesport police officers. To raise money for that program, the fire department sold the T-shirts, which were made and donated by Mc-Keesport firefighter Matt “Matty Wu” Holtzman, owner of McKeesport-based Shogun Graphix.
Additionally, for eight hours on Sunday, a team of teachers and board members and a team of firefighters took turns tending bar. Any tips they earned from their stint as a bartender was donated to Coats for Kids.
The teams were still counting their tips as of presstime, and Patterson said more donations were coming in. He said he should be ready to announce a total amount by Tuesday, adding that he hopes the earnings are greater than the $10,000 raised at the inaugural event in 2017.
With the money from that first event, the firefighters were able to purchase 772 coats and distribute them to Twin Rivers Elementary students. With money they had left over, they were able to purchase and distribute another 60 coats this school year to students who are new to the district and weren’t present at the first Coats for Kids event.
“We just want to make sure every little kid in those schools is warm at the bus stop,” Lopretto said. “We are going to coat the whole school up at Twin Rivers and in the pre-K and kindergarten classes up at Francis McClure, but we want any other students at Francis McClure to know that they have not been forgotten about.
“If any of those kids need coats, we want them to let their teacher know and we will get them a coat. I mean we will coat the whole school if we have to.
“It touches my heart that the firefighters care so much about the kids in our school district,” he said. “They never forget that the kids are an important member of our community, and I appreciate that so much.”
Lopretto said he is proud of MASD teachers for partnering with the firefighters for the event.
“We truly have the best teachers in the world,” he said. “They go out of their way to make sure our students are taken care of.”
Patterson said he and his “brothers” from IAFF Local 10 are glad to help out the school district. He said Lopretto is often modest about “how much good work he does for our school district.”
That’s why at the start of Sunday’s event, the firefighters named Lopretto an honorary member of the fire department.
Patterson said Lopretto is the first person to ever receive that honor, and to commemorate their action the firefighters made Lopretto his own fire helmet.
“This is just the coolest thing,” Lopretto said. “I wasn’t expecting that at all and honestly I was so touched and so honored when they gave me this. Our firefighters are amazing, and I am proud to be named a member in honor only.”
Lopretto joked that he will leave the fighting of fires “to the professionals,” but said he was “moved” by their gesture and admires “the fact that they regularly put their lives on the line for the safety of our community.”
He said the event wouldn’t be possible without generous donors.
“We just want to say thanks to everyone who came out and supported the best event of the year,” Lopretto said.
Through the Protect our Police initiative, the firefighters were able to purchase two bullet-proof vests for the police department in 2017. Patterson said firefighters are hopeful that they will be able to give the police department two more vests this year.
This is the third year the fire department has hosted a fundraising event at Clancy’s.
Last year, the department decided to raise money for school safety initiatives instead of purchasing coats and bulletproof vests. As a result of the 2018 Tips for Kids event, the groups were able to raise enough money to purchase an outdoor metal detector for MASD, classroom door locks for Mary of Nazareth School in White Oak and protective interior classroom window coverings for Serra Catholic High School.
To learn more about the various fundraising initiatives, visit the McKeesport Firefighters IAFF Local 10 Facebook page.