PARKERSBURG, W.Va. — As affected schools and athletic programs in West Virginia continue to recover from last month’s flood, donations have poured in from around the state and elsewhere.
West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission executive director Bernie Dolan this week toured athletic facilities at Clay County High School and Elkview Middle School.
“Just the devastation and the power of water is phenomenal. It’s just very sad,” Dolan said on the MetroNews Statewide Sportsline. “There is a lot of mud still, but they’ve done a good job of getting it out. Clay County had the whole basement flooded where all of their equipment was. There is debris everywhere. It’s just hard to believe.”
Aside from the overall cleanup process, efforts to help out athletic programs, specifically, have spanned across the state and even the country.
“The biggest thing is that the schools have all chipped in,” Dolan said. “It’s amazing when things are down and look bleak, everyone has an opportunity to step forward. We’ve had schools from Huntington over, Wheeling down and Martinsburg down contribute. Everybody is trying to chip in, because they know at any point it could be them. It really has brought out the best.
“We think, through donations or purchasing of new equipment, we should be pretty far along in getting equipment back for the schools,” Dolan continued. “Getting the equipment, though, is just a small part of trying to get their lives together. But it is an opportunity for something to be normal.”
MetroNews and the WVSSAC set up a GoFundMe account to raise donations to help purchase uniforms and equipment for teams and bands.
Donations can be made at www.gofundme.com/suitemup.
The complete interview with Dolan is posted at the top of the page.