Swampscott middle school students get ride of their lives

SWAMPSCOTT – Several Swampscott Middle School students had a SAFE ride to school on Wednesday morning.Ian Crimmins, Abbey Bergman and Erin Johnson ate their fill at the fire station and then were dispatched by a fire alarm to school.The three students were winners in the Student Awareness of Fire Education (SAFE) Program Escape Plan contest, which was sponsored by the fire department.Lt. Remo Zimbaldi and Lt. Sheila Scranton, who have been involved with the SAFE program for 11 years, said the contest was popular with the students.”What we’ve been doing is going into the schools to get kids to think about fire safety,” Scranton said. “We had the kids draw exit plans for their homes with two ways out of each room. These three kids had the best drawing of an escape plan and were chosen to come to the station for a big breakfast with the firefighters.Scranton said the students were served scrambled eggs, pancakes, sausage and chocolate covered donut holes. But the real treat came after breakfast when an alarm sounded and an engine was dispatched to transport the three students to school.”The kids were driven to school on the engine with lights flashing and sirens sounding,” Scranton said. “They thought it was great the way other vehicles moved out of the way so we could get through.”Chief Michael Champion said the department has been receiving $3,664 for the SAFE program each year, but he is concerned about the future of the program given state budget cuts.”It’s a good program,” he said. “I think Remo (Zimbaldi) and Sheila (Scranton) do a great job with the little money we get.”Champion explained the funds are spent based on the academic year, not calendar year, because most of the programming takes place in the schools. He said the department has funds in place for September 2009 but the state has eliminated funding for future SAFE programs.”My understanding is we will have no funding as of September 2010 for the SAFE Program,” he said.