In honor of Deputy Dave Hedley
The community gathered Monday to give back to someone who has given so much of his time and effort serving the people of Sanders County.
The community gathered Monday to give back to someone who has given so much of his time and effort serving the people of Sanders County.
Deputy Dave Hedley, also known as the Sanders County Animal Control Investigator, was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia on March 17. Hedley also works part time for the Thompson Falls Police Department and as a reserve deputy for the Sheriff’s Office. Marty Spring, a deputy for the Sheriff’s Office and a close friend of Hedley’s immediately stepped up and got the ball rolling to hold a blood drive in honor of Hedley, who is currently receiving multiple blood and platelet transfusions every week.
Casandra Carlson stepped up to help organize the blood drive with the American Red Cross, who were more than helpful in setting up a time and place to hold the blood drive in honor of Hedley.
“I keep telling Dave to take care of yourself now and then you can come back and take care of everyone else in the community like he tries to do all of the time,” said Carlson.
The goal was to have 50 units of blood by the time the day was over and by noon nearly 70 people had already signed up to donate.
“It’s in his honor and it’s making sure people understand the importance of blood donation. When you have someone who is as active in the community as Dave it really brings awareness to the forefront,” said Julie Brehm from the American Red Cross.
Carlson said Hedley is currently receiving treatment from Community Hospital in Missoula where he had to immediately begin chemotherapy upon diagnosis. Although he is not able to have many visitors at the moment due to his high risk of infection, Carlson said he was in high spirits all of Monday morning and she was sending him constant picture and text message updates on how the blood drive was going.
“The blood drive is about raising awareness on the importance of blood donation, every day people can use blood not just accident victims. He’s (Hedley) getting blood products on a daily basis and blood is needed and has a shelf life that expires and none of this is directly designated for Dave, but it could very well end up going to him,” said Brehm. “It’s about making sure people understand the importance of why we need them to donate.”
Various members of the community gathered to support Hedley during the blood drive at Thompson Falls High School gym. Sanders County Sheriff Gene Arnold was the first to sign up on Monday morning to donate blood. Along with Arnold, deputies, highway patrolmen, Fish, Wildlife and Parks employees and high school students had signed up to donate.
Arnold said Hedley has been instrumental with the Sheriff’s Office in writing policies and handling animal cruelty investigations properly.
“He’s instrumental in getting the policies written on how you take care of vicious animals and it’s quite extensive,” said Arnold. “He’s been instrumental in that and was basically on call and whenever we had something big like that he got called because he had the knowledge. So we’re giving some blood for Dave today.”
In addition to helping the Sheriff’s Office with animal investigations, Heldey has been a huge organizer in bringing a torch run to Sanders County as part of the Montana Special Olympics. The Montana Special Olympics recently awarded Hedley the Unsung Hero award for his work on bringing awareness to Sanders County.
People involved in the run through the county get donations and sponsorships to raise money for the Special Olympics. This year the torch run, along with a Pony Express ride and bike ride through the county, all to raise funds for the Special Olympics, will be held Sunday, May 2. For more information please visit http://www.somt.org/torchrun/contacts.html. The Valley Press will also have more information on the torch run soon.