In this week\u2019s edition of Size-Up, the County of Los Angeles Fire Department (LACoFD) proudly spotlights the Kevin Woyjeck Explorers for Life Association.<\/p>\n
Kevin Woyjeck, a Southern California native, was deeply influenced by his father, retired LACoFD Fire Captain Joe Woyjeck, to enter the fire service. Kevin joined the LACoFD Explorer Program at the age 15, and by the age of 21 he had graduated from multiple fire academies and had several seasons of hands-on experience working with various crews.<\/p>\n
On June 30, 2013, Kevin, along with 18 other members of the Prescott, Arizona Fire Department\u2019s Granite Mountain Hotshot Crew, died while valiantly fighting the Yarnell Hill Fire. In his memory, Kevin\u2019s parents established the Kevin Woyjeck Explorers for Life Association (KWEFLA), a nonprofit to help underserved fire explorers and cadets pursue careers in the fire service across the nation.<\/p>\n
Led by Kevin\u2019s father, Joe, President, and Kevin\u2019s mother, Anna, Founder and Treasurer, the organization has since grown to be a nationally recognized non-profit that has provided aid to explorers and exploring programs nation-wide.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen my wife Anna reflected on how meaningful the Explorer experience had been for our boys, she realized that many underserved young people wanted to join Explorer and Cadet programs but simply couldn\u2019t afford the required gear, tuition, or training costs,\u201d said Joe. \u201c[Anna] said, \u2018Why don\u2019t we help them? Why don\u2019t we take the love that was shown to us and pour it into underserved youth who want to be part of the fire service?\u2019<\/p>\n
Since 2013, the KWEFLA has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to provide prospective fire explorers with uniforms, equipment, training and tuition fees, scholarships and has given numerous young people opportunities to follow in the footsteps of Kevin.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis organization was created out of love, it continues out of purpose,\u201d said Joe. \u201cIt thrives because Kevin\u2019s spirit continues to inspire people everywhere to lift up underserved youth and help them shine.\u201d<\/p>\n
The LACoFD is proud to support the KWEFLA and expresses gratitude to everyone involved in continuing to spread awareness for Kevin\u2019s legacy and enhancing access for the next generation of explorers. For more information or to support the mission of the KWEFLA, please visit https:\/\/explorersforlife.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In this week\u2019s edition of Size-Up, the County of Los Angeles Fire Department (LACoFD) proudly spotlights the Kevin…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43000,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[28811,28812,131,133,132],"class_list":["post-64393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-lacofd-home","tag-lacofd-news","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}