On Thanksgiving morning, a sergeant on my job suffered a terrible tragedy when his son, a firefighter, was killed in his house when a fire broke out. Members of my department felt helpless knowing that there was nothing we could do to ease the pain he and his family were going through. We decided to start a fundraiser in order to support his family through this terrible ordeal. Having never started a crowdfunding campaign before, I was unsure what to do or how to go about it. I looked into several different sites including Go Fund Me, but ultimately I was concerned about scams and phnoy fundraisers on that platform. Being that this tragedy affected a family of first responders, we decided to go with Fund The First. I set up the campaign on the Fund The First website, but I was still unsure if I made the right decision. Shortly after setting it up I received a call from the CEO of Fund The First, Rob Garland. Rob guided me through the process of establishing the fundraiser and made several recommendations for how to better run the campaign. As soon I spoke to Rob I knew that we made the right decision in choosing Fund The First. We felt comfortable using the platform knowing that it required ID verification which prevents scams. Ultimately, the amount of support that we received for the family was overwhelming. I’d like to thank Rob and the Fund The First community for giving us a platform to provide support, both financially and emotionally, for first responders in need.
