By Savannah Eller
The Gazette
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Being a good neighbor has paid off in an unexpected way for the Stratmoor Hills Fire Protection District, which received a $30,000 donation toward its ballot question campaign this week from a strip club across the street.
“The firefighters and the chief there have been nothing but amazing,” said Holly Johnson, a regional manager for Go Best Biz, an umbrella company that owns the local strip club, Deja Vu Showgirls.
Johnson, who manages the location, said that the Stratmoor Hills firefighters are a welcome presence just a few hundred feet away. That has been especially true when Deja Vu employees have had to call in fires caused by the homeless encampment behind the club.
She said the district firefighters have helped the 80-plus women who work in the club feel safe while waiting for police to arrive during encounters with the encampment. They have also shown neighborly courtesy.
“The chief will even let me know if there’s a package (delivery at the front door),” she said.
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For all those reasons, the donation to fulfill the Citizens for the Stratmoor Hills campaign fundraising goal was an easy call for the club which, along with its parent company, is a prolific philanthropist, Johnson said.
“We like donating, and we like giving back,” she said.
Johnson estimated that Go Best donates, anonymously and publicly, around $3 million a year to various causes. The employees of Deja Vu in Colorado Springs are also frequent givers who recently raised money themselves for a student in need at the school attended by one performer’s child.
Johnson said that children’s aid organizations, first responders and veterans’ causes are all quiet recipients of money from Deja Vu strip clubs around the region.
To Stratmoor Hills Fire District, the donation was a little baffling, but still welcome.
“While I’m not advocating for it — they are a certain type of entertainment I don’t subscribe to — they are a community member of ours,” said Shawn Bittle, the district’s fire chief.
The fire district that encompasses just 4 square miles is hoping voters will approve a property tax increase to add about $769,000 in funding/ Bittle said the district has not raised its mill levy since 2004. He said the district is in need of upgrades to handle a 72% increase in call volume in the past two decades.
The ballot question, if approved, will allow the district to hire three new full-time firefighters to its staff of six. The extra funding would also allow Bittle to implement an initiative he is calling the “fourth seat program,” which will pay half the rent or mortgage up to $950 of volunteers who agree to work one 24-hour shift per week.
Bittle said the overall cost of the program will be about $86,000 split between eight volunteers, which is lower than a full-time firefighter salary.
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He said that the staffing increase, along with equipment upgrades, would help the district respond to more calls. Bittle that said last year Stratmoor had to rely on aid from other agencies to respond to 140 calls, which reduced overall response time.
“We are really struggling as an organization to fulfill our mission,” Bittle said.
Kathy Corcoran, treasurer for the Citizens for Stratmoor Hills Firefighters campaign committee, said that the donation from Deja Vu more than met the campaign’s funding goals. The donation is roughly 10 times what the campaign previously had in its coffers.
In the past week, the committee has been able to afford multiple campaign mailers, large banners and signs, and the services of a professional campaign consultant.
“It’s been moving fast,” she said.
Johnson said that, though Deja Vu would be donating to causes anyway, the strip club has recently been trying to rehabilitate its image in the community. The location last year remodeled its parking lot and exterior, adding more lights in the parking lot and making the building “brighter.”
She said that employees and performers at Deja Vu have defied stereotypes since the location opened in the 1990s.
“It a very tight-knit group there,” she said. “The people are amazing.”
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Bittle said he was confident that voters would see the worth of the tax increase.
“They understand that times have changed and that things have gotten more expensive,” he said.
The last of three community information sessions on the ballot question will be at 7 p.m. Thursday at the 2160 B St. fire station.
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