Sunrise Children’s Services recently posted on social media that electricity was out at the Cumberland Adventure Program (CAP) in Bronston, Kentucky, where 27 boys live in cabins on campus. The post simply asked people to pray.
“The electricity went out, they didn’t have any power and we didn’t know when we would get it back,” said Dale Suttles, president of Sunrise.
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David Pendley, church administrator at First Baptist Church Somerset, called CAP and asked if it had generators. He learned the facility had some older units that did not always work.
“David said, ‘Let me get back with you. Lowe’s has three (generators) and we’re going to get them for you,’” Suttles said.
When Pendley went to Lowe’s to buy the generators, store manager Jeremy Smith declined to sell them to the church. Instead, Smith said Lowe’s would donate three Westinghouse 12,500-watt tri-fuel generators along with three 100-foot heavy-duty contractor extension cords.
‘All about people caring’
“He said, ‘We need to take care of those kids,’” Suttles said. “He gave them to us and First Baptist Somerset delivered them. It is all about people caring.”
FBC Somerset member Kevin Newton, president and CEO of South Kentucky Rural Electric Cooperative Corporation, also helped by coordinating crews to the site through texts with the CAP director.
The generators, valued at about $1,150 each, will be especially helpful with frigid temperatures expected to continue across Kentucky for at least another week.
“With these cold temperatures, you don’t know if you’ll lose power again,” Suttles said. “It’s good peace of mind to have those set up just in case.”
He said the temperature in one of the cabins had dropped to 47 degrees.
Suttles summed it up this way: “A good KBC church saw a need for an agency and institution, and a community partnered with a church to make a difference.”
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by Mark Maynard and originally published by Kentucky Today.
