Blue Wahoos Stadium To Serve As Medical Supplies Drive Drop-Off Location On Friday, April 3

With its accessible location and expansive parking, Blue Wahoos Stadium is one of four area sites being utilized for a Medical Supply Drive on Friday, arranged by the Greater Pensacola Chamber of Commerce.

From 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. Friday, volunteers will be gathering new Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) donated by area businesses and non-essential medical offices.

The Chamber received permission Thursday from the state of Florida to go ahead with the medical drive, following the decision Wednesday by Gov. Ron DeSantis to implement a statewide stay-at-home order.

The supplies will be put into a truck and transported by Emergency Management Team members to aid healthcare facilities in Escambia and Santa Rosa County in efforts to combat the coronavirus pandemic.

“We’ve done food drives, clothing drives and several other types of things at the stadium area and this another example of people using this facility to be able to help our community,” said Blue Wahoos president Jonathan Griffith. “I think this is a great thing the Chamber is doing here in our community.”

The benefit drive was the idea of a Pensacola dermatologist, who reached out to Florida senator Doug Broxson, a Pensacola native, who represents Northwest Florida in the Florida Legislature.

“She expressed there are a lot of non-essential, medical offices, like her own that have some of the PPE supplies that our three major health care providers with COVID-19 testing sites could really utilize because of the national shortage,” said Sara Lefevers, director of external affairs for the Pensacola Chamber of Commerce.

“She asked if there could be donation drive and encourage construction companies, nail salons and non-essential medical offices in our area to donate what they currently have on hand,” she said. “And then once all of this passes, and the supply comes back, it can be replenished.”

Broxson then reached out to both the Pensacola Chamber and Santa Rosa County Chamber of Commerce for help in making it happen.

“And of course, we jumped right all over it, because I think it is a phenomenal idea,” Lefevers said.

The other three area locations will be the Pen-Air Federal Credit Union office on East Nine Mile Road, Grover T’s BBQ restaurant on Hwy. 90 in Milton, along with the Navarre Chamber of Commerce office.

“Everybody was just jumping in and we had several volunteers who contacted us and wanted to help,” Lefevers said. “But we’re only using a limited number of volunteers because of the situation.

Each site will be staffed by three volunteers all wearing protective gear. Those businesses donating are asked to have the items in the back of their car trunk, back of an SUV or the back of a flat-bed truck when driving to the staging area.

This way, it limits contact when the volunteer collects the item. The EMT staff will then collect items at each location at 4 p.m. to distribute to medical facilities.

People can also donate homemade items for use by area assisted care facilities.

The main parking lot fronting Blue Wahoos Stadium will be utilized for the donations – an area Griffith said lends itself to this kind of event.

“It’s another reason why they built this ballpark…to be a center of the community and improving the quality of life,” he said. “It’s a place where multiple functions can happen and this is another one of those opportunities that has presented itself to happen in the ballpark area.”