Supporting the Brave: First Responders Children's Foundation Provides Lifelong Aid to Heroes' Families

The First Responders Children’s Foundation is dedicated to supporting the children and families of those who courageously serve as first responders. Since 2001, the foundation has provided scholarships, mental health support and financial assistance to the children of those who’ve made the ultimate sacrifice or face hardships while protecting our communities. By offering a lifeline of care and opportunity, the foundation honors the bravery of first responders through lasting, meaningful impact. Here is what First Responders Children’s Foundation President and CEO Jillian Crane had to say.

What is the mission of the First Responders Children’s Foundation and how has it evolved?

First Responders Children’s Foundation started really in the aftermath of September 11th, the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. Eight-hundred children lost a first responder parent, and our founder, Al Kahn, was in the children’s licensing and toy business. He had lost his father on Christmas morning when he was a child and he felt strongly moved really to do something for those children, but also then to make the organization viable to grow into a national organization, to really take care of the children of those who run into danger for us. And so after 23 years now, we’ve grown into a national nonprofit with a mission to support police, fire, 911 dispatchers, EMT, paramedics, corrections and their families.

Can you explain what kind of support the foundation provides?

First Responders Children’s Foundation has a couple of pillars. One is financial hardship, which includes bereavement support. If there’s a line-of-duty death and there’s a child around the country, we provide funding immediately. We also work on financial assistance if suddenly there’s an issue where they can’t afford their rent, the electricity, the car payment, child care. The next part of our program is our scholarship program. So we have scholarship recipients from all over the country. The next program we launched, and actually launched after COVID, was a mental health program specifically for children of first responders, which is now 10 sessions that are free, confidential and with culturally competent therapists. And then lastly, part of our mission is to help first responder agencies go into their communities and create trust within the children and the families of the communities they serve.

Can you elaborate on what those community engagement programs are?

The community engagement programs are twofold. One, we help agencies, let’s say they have cadet programs. We call them junior first responder camps. Many agencies, they set up a time where they can have children in their community come in, learn about safety, learn what their local first responders do, try on the gear, learn about how police work. We hope to kind of build that next generation of kids who want to serve that way. And then the other part of our community engagement is one of our biggest programs and it’s our Toy Express. We are very close to many toy companies that want to give back during the holidays. We launched in 2020 the First Responders Children’s Foundation Toy Express, which gives out almost 120,000 toys to 200 agencies and helps those agencies go into their underserved communities and create relationships.

Can you share some of the most impactful stories or testimonials from families who’ve benefited from your service?

I think about a scholarship recipient whose father died on the day of her high school graduation. And she found out about it. She went to her graduation anyway. His police department showed up for her and then she went on to be one of our spokespeople. She went through the mental health program. She’s now a mental health provider.

What else would you like readers to know about?

In Southampton, we had an amazing first-time-ever golf tournament. PLTgolf CEO Brian Weeks said, “Hey, we want to help you guys. We want to do something you’ve never done before.” And we had an incredible relationship with Sebonack Golf Club that stepped up to throw this beautiful event where we were able to bring in new relationships. The Southampton Town Police Department, the fire department, the New York State Police Department, the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department and police department. We had NYPD and FDNY there. We had Suffolk County Sheriff Errol Toulon there and Commander Stephen Udice of New York State Police. And they did a beautiful commemoration of 9/11. But they also shared what it’s like for them and their families to be serving. It was an incredibly beautiful event.

For more information about the First Responders Children’s Foundation, visit 1strcf.org.