Residents reflect
Meanwhile, local residents, officials, and volunteer firefighters who attended last Sunday’s pancake breakfast expressed their support for the event’s hosts. “I wanted to support Company No. 3,” said Michael Stock Jr., who lives in Lake Hill. “When my grandmother was ill two years ago, members of the company responded. I’m also here to try to give back some of their money.”
Pauline Sammons of West Hurley, who was accompanied by a sister who was visiting from Sioux City, Iowa, sounded a similar note. “I read in the paper about this sad situation,” said Sammons. “It wasn’t nice. The company’s members work hard for the donations they get. For someone to take the money is a sin.”
Adam Pizer, a Bearsville resident, who was accompanied by his three-year-old son, Evan, said, “I wanted to bring my son to the fundraiser, to enjoy the breakfast and to see the fire trucks, and also to support the Fire Department after the recent events.” As standard procedure at the pancake breakfasts, Company No. 3 offers children in attendance a tour of the firehouse and a chance to sit at the wheel of a fire truck.
Jackie Van Kleeck, a Woodstock native and pancake breakfast regular, joined Company No. 3’s Ladies Auxiliary in 1956 and, subsequently, when she moved to Bearsville, the Company No. 1 auxiliary, where she remains a longtime member. Alluding to Hughes’s alleged embezzlement, she said, “This happens in a lot of organizations; so what? I know that he didn’t mean to do it, but he did. What a turnout there is today. It just goes to show that the fire department really cares about their men and women. This proves it.”
Among those on hand were Woodstock supervisor Jeremy Wilber, former supervisor Jeff Moran, and current Town Board members Ken Panza and Jay Wenk. “I just wanted to show that Company No. 3 is an important part of this community and always will be,” said Wilber.
Company responds
Robert Meci, who is president of Company No. 3, took a break from his duties as a waiter to reflect on the turnout. “This all that we could have hoped for,” said Meci. “We really appreciate the community for turning out and supporting us.”
Dougherty echoed those sentiments in his subsequent e-mail, remarking, “Our members were overwhelmed by the support of both the community and the members of the other fire companies from Woodstock. One of the members of the Ladies Auxiliary started to tear up as she was talking about how great the neighbors were to come out and support us.”
In statements following the release of the comptroller’s audit, Company No. 3 officials emphasized that the recent financial upheaval would have no effect on the company’s readiness to respond to emergencies. As if on cue, sirens sounded in Lake Hill at 10:08 a.m. and again at 10:44 a.m. on Sunday, with the pancake breakfast still under way. Two calls — both false alarms, as it turned out — had reported separate incidents requiring attention at a single address in Bearsville.
Volunteers who had been doubling as short-order cooks dropped their aprons and clambered into their firefighting gear. Three trucks rolled out of the firehouse bays, turned right onto Route 212, and raced south.
