Wood County delivers donated supplies to Ohio County flood victims
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PARKERSBURG -- Wood County residents came out and donated needed items for people in Ohio County impacted by recent flooding.
A flood relief drive was held Monday at the Wood County Resiliency Center where people donated bottled water, mops, brooms, garbage bags, diapers, baby wipes, hand sanitizer, sunscreen, tooth brushes, tooth paste, blankets, Gatorade and more to help people in Ohio County.
Wood County Commission President Blair Couch and Wood County Sheriff Rick Woodyard drove the donated items up in a 16-foot box truck on Tuesday to a staging area set up at a gymnasium at Wheeling Jesuit University.
"The truck was full of supplies," Couch said during Thursday's Wood County Commission meeting, as he gave the other commissioners a report about the effort.
There were teams of volunteers who helped unload the truck the local donations were hauled in. Volunteers were getting supplies together to be delivered to three locations where impacted people could come and pick them up. Volunteers were putting different supplies into buckets that would be handed out at these locations.
"The unfortunate thing was they had been inundated with cases of water and were told not to take any more water," Couch said, adding they had two rows of cases of water that were four cases high.
"Sheriff Woodyard called the Sheriff in Ohio County and offered them the water which they took," he said.
Couch said among the things he and Woodyard delivered, organizers really appreciated the fly traps and water hoses.
"Who would have ever thought of that," Couch asked. "A lot of people donated toothpaste, tooth brushes, Clorox bleach, paper towels, wet wipes and more."
From past instances where donations were needed with natural disasters, Coach said he remembers wet wipes being appreciated to help people be able to clean themselves up as they could not always take a shower or bathe.
"I bought a lot of those and put them on the truck," he said.
Some people locally were impacted by the flood. An employee at Camden Clark lost a relative in the flooding, Couch said.
Couch said he has been asked about areas in Wood County that are prone to flooding which included Happy Valley, properties along the Little Kanawha River (east of Happy Valley) and Anns Drive. Couch said the people along Anns Drive in a number of the elevated homes will rent trucks from him to get stuff out of their lower storage areas before the water comes in.
The people of Wood County really turned out to help the people in Ohio County with the flood drive, he said.
"We always knew that Wood County is a caring community and the amount of donations they gave to their fellow West Virginians was so well received," he said. "We are proud of our community and proud of them as well.
"It was a long day but very worthwhile."
In other business, the commission announced three vacancies on the Wood County Alternative Transportation System Council which had the people serving interested in continuing their terms, they put Dennis McAtee in nomination for a position on the Wood County Fire Board and they announced a vacancy on the Enforcement Agency for the Abandoned and Dilapidated Building Ordinance.
Anyone interested in the Enforcement Agency is asked to call the county administrator's Office at 304-424-1984.
Brett Dunlap can be reached at bdunlap@newsandsentinel.com.