13 kids born to employees in last 11 months; 3 more are on the way
It’s unlike anything Kissimmee Fire Chief Jim Walls has seen in his 36 years in the business. One of his retired deputy chiefs said the same of his 40-year tenure.
It has nothing to do with fighting fires or rescuing the sick or injured.
It may have to do with a future day care center.
Walls and city officials helped throw a mini-celebration Thursday morning for over a dozen new parents and their spouses or partners. They’ve all become new parents within the last year.
Of the 13 — eight boys, five girls — three were born in the same week in December, and four others arrived between Feb. 14 (two that day) and Feb. 20.
And it’s not over, as Walls noted another firefighter’s wife is due, “Any day now, and we haven’t heard from them today so she might’ve gone into labor,” and two others are expecting.
Walls was asked if he thought there might be “something in the water” or if it was a COVID-19 after-effect.
“No, it’s a little past that. It’s just coincidence,” he said. “We have a lot of young firefighters in their 20s, some newlyweds doing what they do, all starting families, and it happened to be at the same time.”
“It’s not like there was a lockdown or anything,” said newly-promoted Lt. Mike Dorcella with his daughter, like most of the parents on Thursday, there with their first child, like EMT Kailey White, who’s daughter Stevie White-Mckinnon, named after two grandparents, just turned four months old. She said the life of a 24-on, 24-off paramedic makes parenting different.
“You have to adapt and overcome, so I’m excited to see her when I come home in the morning. But we’re doing great. It was a challenge at first, but everyone is really accommodating. And it’s really fun being a part of this baby boom. The kids are going to have so much fun growing up together. We’re all a family here at work anyway, so it’s going to be great.”
White, and fire inspector Jillian Waldrum, who’s son Easton was born Dec. 10, both said “it was crazy” hearing every month that someone else was pregnant.
“I didn’t tell people, until I heard that Kailey was, and then somebody else was, so I was like, ‘Well ….,’” Waldrum said.
Walls, the father of four and grandfather of seven himself, again marveled that the department could have 16 new additions in a 14-month span, hence the reason for Thursday’s happy get-together.
“What better way to honor families than to welcome all these new additions to the Kissimmee Fire Department,” he said.
