Published: April 02, 2009 10:11 am      

Waltonville fire dept. holding pancake and sausage breakfast

By TESA CULLI

tesa.culli@register-news.com

WALTONVILLE — For 32 years, the Waltonville Fire Protection District has hosted a pancake and sausage breakfast to help support the all-volunteer department.

Area residents and guests are invited to the annual fund-raiser, which will be held from 6 a.m. to noon Saturday at the Waltonville Grade School cafeteria.

“We do the cooking,” Chief Ed Delaney said. “We buy the sausage through the Waltonville Cafe now, and it comes precooked, but we heat it up. We used to get hogs donated, butchered and made into sausage, but that got to be a lot of work and expense. It’s easier to do it this way these days.”

The breakfast is all-you-can-eat, and the tickets, which are available at the door, are $5 for adults and $3 for children 12 years old and younger.

The department boasts 21 volunteers, and covers an area of 90 square miles, Delaney said. The proceeds from the breakfast go toward equipment purchases for the department.

“I’m thinking maybe we’ll get a ventilation fan this time around,” Delaney said. The last equipment purchase was a 6-wheeler all terrain vehicle that has been equipped to be used to fight grass fires, he said.

“We get a fair share of grass and field fires,” Delaney noted. “And, we’re here to provide mutual aid to anyone else around us if they need it.”

Waltonville provided mut-ual aid in fighting a large field fire on Woodlawn Road near Richview Road in March — a fire that also brought in firefighters from Woodlawn and Mt. Vernon City to assist Jefferson Fire Protection District. The fire burned about 140 acres and was whipped up by wind gusts.