North Pole post: N.S. firefighters collect letters to Santa, return them by hand during postal strike

Fire departments across Nova Scotia are doing their part to ensure children’s letters to Santa make their way to the North Pole while Canada Post workers are on strike.

When Trish Pittman, a firefighter with the Enfield Volunteer Fire Department, realized Santa letters would be impacted by the strike, she felt she had to come up with a solution.

“When Canada Post went on strike and they said that the mail wouldn’t be going out, my first thought was, ‘Oh my gosh. The Canada Post does Christmas letters.’ And so, I kind of hemmed and hawed and I looked at my husband and I said, ‘What if we put a mailbox out for Enfield Fire?’” said Pittman.

“I posted on our Facebook page that Santa had dropped off a mail bag and so, we put a postbox out and we were going to put all the letters that we got in Santa’s special mail bag.”

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Since then, the initiative has grown, with dozens of Nova Scotia fire departments now collecting Santa letters in special mailboxes.

The plan is to return the letters to the North Pole using Santa’s special mail bag, although in some cases, Santa is stopping by departments to collect the letters himself.

Once Santa sends back his response, the firefighters plan to hand-deliver each letter back to the sender with a special message from Santa himself. In some cases, the boss of the North Pole may even tag along for the special deliveries.

According to Pittman, the Enfield detachment has already received around 180 letters.

The Wolfville Fire Department in Wolfville, N.S., has also jumped in on the joyful initiative.

Deputy Fire Chief Chad Schrader says his team didn’t hesitate when they heard the idea.

“Enfield was really concerned that children weren’t going to get their traditional Christmas letters … it was a service that Canada Post always took care of but in the eyes of their strike, they were not in a position to offer that service this year,” said Schrader.

“So, Enfield started this initiative that the firefighters would get the letters to Santa and then return them to the child so that they didn’t go a Christmas without getting that response, that cherished response from Santa.”

Schrader says his department had received 55 letters to Santa as of Tuesday afternoon – a number they expect to continue to grow.

“We’re hoping to get in the area of 100 or 150 letters,” he said.

A mailbox for letters to Santa is seen outside the Enfield Volunteer Fire Department in Enfield, N.S. (CTV Atlantic/Hafsa Arif)

He says even Santa himself is pleased with the initiative.

“Our response from Santa has been incredible. So far, he’s very happy that the local fire departments are helping him get his message out and we’re super happy to be able to provide this support to the community,” Schrader said.

Seabright and District Fire Department Development Lieutenant Riley Coffey also saw the idea online and wanted to join in on the holiday fun.

“The letters are in all of our pasts and that was a way to get your list across and have that wish come true,” said Coffey.

So far, the Seabright department has received around 80 letters with more on the way.

He says his team is talking about making the initiative a yearly tradition.

“This past summer we did an open house, and so that will be an annual thing, and then this as well I believe will be an annual thing. I think it will just keep picking up and picking up,” Coffey said.

“I think it is probably going to morph into a yearly tradition … We don’t want to take away (from Canada Post). They very much enjoy this part of their job,” said Schrader.

“So, we don’t want to take away that joy from them, but I also can see that children and parents are going to come to expect it because we do make things a little bit of a spectacle when we take the note back to the child. So, maybe some collaboration with Canada Post, who knows. It’s certainly all open to discussion. We’re just super pumped that we could do that for the children this year and what the future looks like, we’re certainly willing to work with whomever to make that happen again.”

Firefighters say the experience has been heartwarming, humbling and even overwhelming at times.

“To get that personal response from a parent or a child when we’re dropping (letters) off, it really honed in why we did it and why our membership was so keen to do it,” said Schrader.

“You know, you take this on, you don’t know how many you’re going to get, you have to have some level of commitment from your folks before you embark on an initiative like this and our guys and girls are two feet in. They’re dedicated to this.”

“Everyone is saying, ‘Thank you for taking this on. Thank for you doing this. Our kids love it, it’s been really, really nice,” Coffey said.

“Parents and children seem very excited especially for the fact that a fire truck will be delivering Santa’s responses, so they seem pretty excited for that too,” said Pittman.

On Wednesday, Santa made a personal trip to the Enfield fire department to gather his next collection of letters.

“I’ve read the letters, and we keep going. It takes a lot of time to do,” Santa said.

Santa Claus responds to letters sent by children from across Nova Scotia. (CTV Atlantic/Hafsa Arif)

During his pitstop, he had one special request for Maritime families.

“Clean your chimneys. Mrs. Claus hates when I come home with soot on my uniform,” said the jolly old man.

Participating fire departments all have different deadlines for the letters, which can be found on their Facebook pages.

Departments are asking children and families to include a return address on each letter so Santa’s response finds its way to the right home.

For more Nova Scotia news, visit our dedicated provincial page.