Chili cook-off raises funds for injured bartender

CONTINUED FROM FRONT PAGE gift cards and mugs, courtesy of the pub, the Cools Team at Compass and their colleague at Compass Realty, Kelly Forman.

Bernice McCann, of Baldwin, took first place in the cook-off.

“We’re here to help her out,” Jessica McCarthy, a patron at the pub, said of Berg. “She can’t work and she needs to pay medical bills. She needs to feed herself. She needs to pay rent. It’s what you do. We’re a community. We take care of each other.”

Berg said she was hit by the vehicles on Nov. 3 while she was crossing Merrick Road after finishing a shift at the library, and was on her way to the pub, which is across the street from the library. A car headed west struck her and threw her into the eastbound lanes, where she was hit by another vehicle headed in the opposite direction.

Berg said she broke her left foot, shattered her right shoulder blade and fractured her skull in the accident, and spent five weeks in the hospital. She is still recovering, mentally as well as physically, she said.

“I’m lucky,” Berg said. “Most people don’t make it out of things like that.”

Shawn Sabel, the pub’s owner, reached out to her the day after the accident, Berg said, and asked her if he could dedicate the chili cook-off to her and turn it into a fundraiser.

“We’re here to raise a bunch of money,” Sabel said on Sunday, “and eat as much chili as we can.”