Santa Run a big success in Arlington

Published 9:25 pm Thursday, December 24, 2009

ARLINGTON — Despite difficult economic times, the results of the city’s Santa Run seem to get better every year.

The Arlington Fire Department and Santa Claus visited city neighborhoods each evening from Dec. 5 through Dec. 16. Families donated food for the Arlington Food Bank and children received hugs and candy canes from Santa, who rode on a decorated fire truck.

The department hoped to raise at least as much food and cash for the food bank as it did last year, said Ronda Davies, the fire department’s Santa Run coordinator

“But, to our amazement, we received triple the amount of cash donations and had a huge increase in food from last year,” Davies said. “There was so much food we completely filled the Arlington food bank.”

The donated food weighed more than 6,700 pounds. Cash donations totaled $3,825.

With the food bank’s shelves overflowing, some of the food collected was passed along and shared with neighboring food banks, Davies said.

The generosity of the people of Arlington is not surprising to Fire Chief Jim Rankin. “Arlington residents always rally around those in our community who are down,” Rankin said. “This increase in giving of food and money this year, even though many people may be having hardships of their own, really shows the true community spirit of those who live here.” Also called the 12 Nights of Christmas, the Santa Run is a tradition of more than 21 years in Arlington. It started as a way for Santa to greet Arlington children, then at some point people began giving firefighters food to deliver to low-income families in town, Davies said.

Santa Claus is accompanied by a team of helpers made up of fire department crews, city employees, youth groups and members of civic and service groups.

When children hear Christmas music playing from the fire engine, they know to run out of their houses to visit with Santa, who hands out candy canes to everyone.

“We consider this year’s Santa Run one of the best ever,” Davies said.

Gale Fiege: 425-339-3427; gfiege@heraldnet.com.