I wish to start this reply by personally apologizing to you and your family for breaking the tradition. The decision to move the Santa Run to the Sunday before Christmas was painfully deliberated for over five years. The decision to alter a long held tradition and staple of a neighborhood is not an easy one to make. Several factors played into our decision to change the date Santa visits us, the most important of which is the large increase in population and number of houses within Fire District #1. In the past it was relatively easy to ensure that every resident received an equal chance to have Santa visit with them. This is not the case today. The past few Santa Runs have become increasingly rushed in order to traverse the entire District and it is the feeling of the membership that Santa’s interaction with the children has suffered innumerably. The feeling was reinforced last year by several comments made by residents that were overheard by our members. It is our sincerest hope that by changing the date in which Santa visits us, it will allow us to share Santa with each child in the District for the most amount of time.

We have entertained other options as a possible solution. The first was tested last year. We attempted to have several stops within the Fire District that children could gather at, however in order to keep Santa on our limited schedule the number of stops had to be kept low. This option did not work as intended. The second option was simply, in our opinion, not feasible. This option is not fit to for public display for the same reason that we felt was not feasible, if you would like to know what it was you can e-mail me at rlynch@crosswicksfire.org.

Holding the Santa Run on the Sunday before Christmas will allow the membership to start earlier, run longer, and end later. Our only goal is to make sure every child in the District gets the visit with Santa that they deserve.

If you would like to discuss the issue further you can e-mail me, rlynch@crosswicksfire.org, at any time and I would be happy to speak with you. Once again I would like to extend my sincerest apologies on behalf of Union Fire Company #1.