By Patricia Breakey
Delhi News Bureau
Area police agencies
are hoping people will add
a little bit of blue to their
holiday decorating
this
year.
Delaware
County Sheriff
Tom Mills
and sheriff’s
departments
in Otsego
and Schoharie counties are
encouraging people to take
part in Project Blue Light
to honor police officers.
“Tis the time of year
when we begin to think
about unraveling the miles
of tangled Christmas lights
and dragging out the ladder
to decorate our homes
for the Christmas season,
Mills said in letter to
county residents Monday.
“I would like to take this
opportunity to solicit your
consideration
of incorporating
Project
Blue Light
by placing a
single blue
bulb in your
Christmas
decorations which will be
visible from outside.”
The blue lights pay tribute
to police officers lost in
the line of duty and show
appreciation for all police
officers who continue to
serve and protect, Mills
said.
Otsego County Undersheriff
Cameron Allison
said, “The blue light also
signifies support and
thanks to
those officers
who
continue
to work the
streets and
jails 24
hours a day,
every day of
the year.”
Schoharie
County Sheriff John
S. Bates Jr. said he thinks
putting up blue lights is
a very simple way to take
part in an important program.
In 1988, a Philadelphia
woman put blue lights in
her windows during the
holiday season in honor
of her son-in-law, a police
officer who had been killed
in the line of duty.
“The color blue is a
symbol of peace, and this
holiday season we urge all
Americans to remember
our domestic peacekeepers
— the men and women
of law enforcement — by
putting blue lights in
your windows and trimming
your tree and home
in blue,” Craig W. Floyd,
chairman and chief executive
of the National Law
Enforcement Officers
Memorial Fund, said in a
media release.
“Blue lights during the
holiday season are a visible
reminder of the service
and sacrifice that law
enforcement officers make
on behalf of all Americans
365 days a year.”
The tradition traces its
roots to Dolly Craig’s 1999
letter to the organization
Concerns of Police Survivors.
Craig wrote that
she would be putting blue
lights in her windows that
holiday season in honor
of her late son-in-law,
Philadelphia police officer
Danny Gleason. She
thought others might like
to share her idea.
“Now, each year, we see
thousands of blue lights,
symbolic for both the support
of peace officers as
well as the hope for peace
in the following year, displayed
throughout the
country in the windows
of homes, businesses and
churches,” Mills wrote.
___
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City Editor Emily Popek
at 432-1000 or (800)
721-1000, ext. 217; fax her
at 432-5707; e-mail her at
news @ thedailystar.com;
or write to her at P.O. Box
250, Oneonta, NY 13820.
