Breckenridge Police Dept. wins Battle of the Badges Blood Drive
By Carla McKeown/Breckenridge Texan
The Breckenridge Police Department won bragging rights for the next year, after the agency was declared the winner in the community’s annual Battle of the Badges Blood Drive, hosted by the Breckenridge Rotary Club and Carter BloodCare.
“We really appreciate everything that you guys do and thank you for participating in this fun little thing that we get to do every year in the summertime, which is when we really, really need blood,” Colleen Horan with Carter BloodCare said during Tuesday’s Breckenridge Rotary Club meeting.
Horan explained that 2026 has been a difficult year for blood banks, with the American Red Cross declaring a national blood supply crisis – only the second such declaration in its 140-year history – after blood donations fell to a four-year summer low, deepening an emergency shortage that threatened the availability of lifesaving blood for patients across the country.
Colleen Horan with Carter BloodCare, left, presents the Breckenridge Texan’s Carla McKeown and Tony Pilkington with Battle of the Badges T-shirts in appreciation for the publicity about the annual blood drive. (Photo by Kevin Roach)
Summertime tends to be troublesome for blood banks, Horan said, because not only does the need for blood often increase during the summer months, but since students aren’t in school, the school-based blood drives aren’t taking place. That situation led to the Battle of the Badges blood drives, which encourage blood donors to vote for their favorite first responders when they donate blood during the event.
This year’s Battle of the Badges, which took place in June, was Breckenridge’s tenth annual event. The friendly competition let those who donated blood vote for the Breckenridge Police Department, the Breckenridge Fire Department, the Stephens County Sheriff’s Office or Sacred Cross EMS.
The BPD’s win was their second victory in the local event’s history. Overall, the fire department has won the competition five times, and the sheriff’s office and the police department have each won twice. Sacred Cross won the contest last year, their first time to participate in the blood drive.
Horan said this year’s competition was close, with only two votes separating the top two agencies. She presented the plaque to Police Chief Blake Johnson.
She also thanked others involved in the organizing and coverage of the event. “Thank you to all of the agencies and if you donated or you helped promote the blood drive. Thank you to Sherry and Wes (Strickland) for being our blood drive coordinators all the time. You guys do such a great job. Thank you so much. Really, you’re so helpful,” Horan said. “… we want to thank Tony (Pilkington) and Carla (McKeown) for promoting the blood drive, coming out, taking the pictures, getting the word out (through the Breckenridge Texan). We have special Battle of the Badges T-shirts for both of you. So thank you for your support. We really do appreciate everybody. Everybody helps. Everybody helps in their own special way, and we really appreciate it.”
Horan said she looked through Carter BloodCare’s records, going back to Nov. 2, 1990, the oldest information she could find on the Breckenridge Rotary Club’s blood drives. “The total number of units of blood donated since you guys started these blood drives is 7,042 pints of blood,” she said. “And we really, really appreciate you guys so much.”
The next blood drive, hosted by the Breckenridge Rotary Club and Carter BloodCare, will be from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 3, at Texas State Technical College, 307 N. Breckenridge Ave. Click here to pre-register to donate blood.
Local first responders gathered for a group photo with Carter BloodCare’s Colleen Horan before she announced the winners of the 2026 Battle of the Badges blood drive. Pictured, from left, are Stephens County Sheriff Kevin Roach, Chief Deputy Justin Rose, Dustin Wright with Sacred Cross EMS, BPD Capt. Jay Walker, Officer Elena Arellano, Breckenridge Police Chief Blake Johnson, Assistant Fire Chief Wesley Turner and Colleen Horan. (Photo by Tony Pilkington/Breckenridge Texan)
Cutline, top photo: Colleen Horan with Careter BloodCare, right, presents a plaque to the Breckenridge Police Department for receiving the most votes in the 2026 Battle of the Badges Blood Drive in June. Accepting the award are Breckenridge Police Chief Blake Johnson, second from right; Capt. Jay Walker, left; and Officer Elena Arellano, center. (Photo by Tony Pilkington/Breckenridge Texan)
