Amarillo’s Firehouse Subs donates $24,400 to Boys Ranch Fire Department for new equipment

AMARILLO, Texas (KFDA) - Rounding up your change at Amarillo’s Firehouse Subs an make a huge difference.

The business recently donated over $24,000 to the Boys Ranch Fire Department for new equipment that will help save lives.

The department purchased four new self-contained breathing apparatuses with the funds and is thankful for the donation.

“Oh my gosh, that was a God send,” said Captain Mike Pacino, with the Boys Ranch Fire Department. “This equipment has a value of about $24,400. That’s more than we get the budget for our fire department for three years.”

The department is comprised of 30 volunteer adult and junior firefighters. The new carbon fiber tanks will replace 20-year-old steel SCBA’s.

According to Coby Jones, the owner of Firehouse Subs, this donation was all thanks for the Amarillo community.

“Our community, the Amarillo community, are really the only ones who helped get this,” said Jones. “They donated at the registers through round up procedures, they buy pickle buckets for $3. They donate during the public safety month, which is in October, and all of this helps us collect money to give to the Public Safety Foundation, and we were able to do something like this locally. Without our local support from the Amarillo community, we probably wouldn’t be able to do this.”

“I see about 75 to 80 percent of our guests donating to the Public Safety Foundation,” said Javier Gutierrez, manager at Firehouse Subs.

The donations will make the firefighters’ jobs safer and easier.

“With these new SCBA’s it’s a whole lot easier to do,” said Captain Pacino. “The tanks are lighter, they hold more pressure, they take the heat better, everything.”

The Boys Ranch Fire Department is the first department in the Texas Panhandle to receive a grant from Firehouse Subs.

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