Maricopa firefighter finds comfort in Pink Heals Tour

This year Maricopa was the last stop on the Pink Heals Tour, a program that helps community fundraising efforts to battle all cancers, especially those that inflict women. 

Or, as Maricopa firefighter Jared Hobson – who has participated in the tour twice – put it, the organization focuses on “putting women first in all things.”

“We spread love and awareness and hope for any type of cancer a woman might have,” Hobson said.

This year’s tour began July 27 in Sedona and made stops in New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, California and Nevada.

Hobson lost his mother to breast cancer in 2003.

“I wanted to do something,” Hobson said. “The first year I did the tour, it brought a lot of closure with my mom and a lot of healing.”

It also helped Hobson to decide how he wanted to contribute to charitable causes.

“It’s opened my eyes to how I want to donate my time,” Hobson said. “I really believe we should help the women in our community.”

Pink Heals Tour differs from other cancer fundraising groups in that every cent raised within a community stays within that city or town to help those who live there.

The tour partners on different fundraisers depending on what a community wants, promoting them by fire turcks and police cars painted pink.

The organization does sell T-shirts and other merchandise, but that’s only “to get us the gas to get to the next community,” Hobson said.

Money raised is used to help “just do little things like getting (a woman) a wig or a gas card,” Hobson said. “A thousand bucks can go a long way in the community.”

To learn more about the Pink Heals tour, visit www.PinkFireTrucks.org.