SIMI VALLEY : Firefighters Fill the Boot to Fight Disease

Fire Capt. Jim Ackerman, his red helmet bobbing against a current of cars and arms that were waiving dollars, worked the Simi Valley intersection Friday morning like a carnival barker.

“We’ll take cash. We’ll take checks. We don’t care. We’ll take credit cards,” Ackerman called out, challenging motorists to drop $1, $5 or $10 into his black rubber boot for the Muscular Dystrophy Assn. at Sycamore Drive and Cochran Street.

For the fifth time since 1989, several off-duty Ventura County firefighters staked out the corners and concrete dividers at the busy intersection to help fight 40 neuromuscular diseases. About two dozen volunteers were expected to participate in the “Fill the Boot” fund-raiser Friday and today.

Sixteen-month-old Ian McAlevey, held in his aunt’s arms, giggled as he dropped a dollar into the boot held by Firefighter Chad Cook, who coordinated the fund-raiser.

“Thanks, bub,” Cook said. He showed his appreciation by flicking on the red lights of an adjacent fire engine for the toddler.

Moments earlier, a yellow pickup truck drifted by at about 15 m.p.h. as Ackerman reached out from the center divider and snapped up a $1 donation from the driver’s outstretched arm. “Thank you, thank you,” he cried out.

Pedestrians, tradesmen in vans, teen-age girls, people of all stripes and ages answered the firefighters’ appeals for donations.

Julie Beasley, 22, of Simi Valley gave $5, 63-year-old Jack Slaughter about $10.

“Simi Valley is a very giving community, despite its hardships,” said Muscular Dystrophy Assn. district director Liz Kelleher, referring to local victims of the Jan. 17 earthquake.

“And they love the firefighters,” she added. “They’re the heroes, the good guys.”

County firefighters did not hold their annual muscular dystrophy fund-raiser in Simi Valley last fall due to the rash of wildfires. Donations for the charity slipped accordingly, Kelleher said. Firefighters collected $7,000 at the intersection in 1992.

In Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties last year, volunteers raised $240,000 compared to $310,000 collected the previous year, Kelleher said.

Nationally, the Muscular Dystrophy Assn. raised $106 million last year, including $46 million from entertainer Jerry Lewis’ telethon, she added.