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Lexington Fire Department Names Junior Chief

Students, teachers, and firefighters gathered at Clays Mill Elementary School Tuesday morning to name this year’s Junior Fire Chief. 

Fifth-graders from around the county wrote essays on fire safety and prevention, with the best writer getting the chance to be a young dignitary for the department.  This year’s winner, Alexandra Brown, said she got the idea for her essay after travelling with her mom to the grocery store.  

“I started looking up  some facts about how smoke alarms save lives, and I started typing, and so when I was done with it, my sisters, they read it, and thought it was really good.  I turned it in the next day and the next thing you know, I’m fire chief," she said.

At the ceremony, Brown wore a fire chief’s uniform and was given an official badge by Keith Jackson, the city’s current fire chief and a Clays Mill Graduate.  Battalion Chief Joe Best says the Junior Fire Chief program has been in existence since the 1960s, and Brown, like her predecessors, will help the department disseminate information on fire safety, particularly among children. 

“She just helps us get our word out, maybe in a way that might be a better way to target children.  It’s basically a lesson for kids in the words of a young person," he explained.

Brown will represent the Department during Fire Prevention Week, and serve as a Grand Marshall at the parade, which kicks off the festivities.  Those events begin this Sunday, October 5th.                    

Chase Cavanaugh first got on the air as a volunteer reader for Central Kentucky Radio Eye, a local news service for the visually impaired. He began reporting for WUKY in February 2012, after receiving his Master’s degree from the University of Kentucky’s Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce.