Through its 2026 Funds for Firefighters initiative, the Black Hills Corporation Foundation split more than $33,000 among fourteen rural fire departments across Colorado. The program was designed to help smaller departments contend with budget pressures and climbing equipment prices, allowing them to keep essential safety tools in service.
Cripple Creek's fire department was one of the fourteen to benefit, taking in $2,500. The department's fire chief explained to KRDO13 that the department is not structured as a fire protection district, meaning it draws its entire budget from the city rather than from a dedicated fire tax. Chronic underfunding has been a long-standing challenge there. "Our budget was tight. It was tight when I got here almost five years ago, and it continues to be tight," the chief said.
Inflation in fire-service supply costs has compounded that pressure, with the chief noting that common items like hoses have more than doubled in price. "We have hoses that used to be a couple hundred dollars is now $500 or $600," the chief said. "So with everything doubling in cost, we were really falling behind in maintaining proper equipment."
A portion of the grant went toward purchasing wildland fire shelters. The chief described the shelters as a last resort for crews at risk of being overrun by a fast-moving fire. "If we are put in a position where the wildfire is going to overtake the position that we're in, this is a last ditch effort to save the lives of the firefighters," the chief said.
Grant dollars also covered two replacement cardiac defibrillators; the units they replaced were roughly two decades old and had become hard to keep in reliable working condition through everyday use. The chief noted the problem directly: "It has a lifespan and we were having more and more trouble with being harder and harder to keep them calibrated. And we were using them every day."
After completing those acquisitions, the chief credited the foundation with helping close a gap the department could not fill on its own. "The nonprofit has helped wonderfully to fill that gap," the chief said.
Whether additional Pikes Peak region departments applied for grants through the 2026 program, and whether the foundation plans future funding rounds, has not yet been reported.