By: Lydia Crawley
The Parsons Advocate
At the Tucker County Commission meeting the Commission approved a request from Stormy Meloy on behalf of the West Virginia Special Olympics. The organization asked the Commission for assistance with funding a rental van and overnight accommodation for a bowling competition in Charleston.
“I’m here on behalf of the Olympics, the Tucker County group,” Meloy said. “We are coming with a funding request.”
Among those accompanying Meloy were Special Olympic Athletes Meloy called Rocky and Isaiah. “I have two athletes, Rocky and Isaiah,” Meloy said.
According to Meloy, the Special Olympics group in the county has grown and has gained additional community support. “We actually have grown our group,” Meloy said. “We’re getting two new athletes starting in November so we’re actually growing. We have more community support than we have before. The four-by-four races are very generous to us. We work the races; they give us a $1,000 which goes a long way. We take up donations and the community members are amazing. Shop and Save back in I think it was 2021 gave us a $1,000 donation. We weren’t expecting that so that Parsons Shop and Save was a blessing.”
Meloy said the organization was requesting help with funding a rental van and hotel expenses for the group. “So, we’re here asking for help with rental vans to go to our bowling tournament in Charleston.,” Meloy said. “Which is December the 9th and 10th. And also for hotel travel also the night before.”
Meloy said the group has found the athletes perform better if they are able to stay overnight the night before rather than travel the day of the event. “We found that Summer Games we went down the night before because you have to be in Charleston so early in the morning. And then they are so overwhelmed and overstimulated that I feel they just competed so much better. We took home gold, silver and stuff in Charleston because they were well rested and didn’t have to anticipate that ride.”
The Commissioners spoke with Rocky and Isaiah about their experiences. Tucker County Commissioner Mike Rosenau asked Rocky about his bowling. “Rocky, do you like bowling?”
Rocky replied that he did. “Good, good,” Rosenau said. “Do you compete really well down there? I do, too. I get real competitive when I bowl.”
Tucker County Commissioner Fred Davis asked Isaiah what his favorite sport was and Isaiah said it was Bowling. “Isaiah, what’s your favorite sport down there?” Davis said. Isaiah also said he had played Cornhole over the summer.
The Commissioners said they had seen that Isaiah had competed over the summer on Facebook and said they follow the Special Olympics Athletes progress on Facebook. “I watch you guys on Facebook all the time,” Rosenau said.
Isaiah has been involved with the Special Olympics since he was eight years old. “I’ve been in it since I was eight years old,” Isaiah said. “My brother went in when he was five years old.” According to Maloy, Isaiah will soon be 28 years old.
“So let me ask you this,” Rosenau said. “You’re getting rooms and every athlete that’s going down on the van has the available to spend the night?”
“Absolutely,” Maloy said. “Including the volunteers. And what we do, we’ll load up, we’ll go down the night before, we’ll take them to eat – like, dinner is on them, that night – and then after they compete – usually on Saturday – we take them to dinner. We went to IHOP last time. That’s why the meals and we paid for every athlete and every volunteer out of our county funds because they typically have spaghetti or they have something and not every athlete likes that. So, we took them to IHOP in Charleston. They were absolutely wonderful. They got what they wanted and had a great time.”
Maloy also reassured the Commission that the group’s local bank account was overseen by the State organization for withdrawals. “If you guys make that check to Special Olympics of West Virginia what happens is – and this is good information for you – that goes to our bank here in Mountain Valley and anyone is allowed to deposit that,” Maloy said. “But, it is watched by the CEO in Charleston. And in order to request funds, we’re able to request funds out of it, but we have to send a paper stating what we are requesting it for. And then he issues us the check for the money and we sign it and then we supply him with receipts also. ”
“Guys, I hope you do well,” Rosenau said. “And you know what I would like, is after you go to Charleston, I would like a presentation back here on how you do. After you go, it would be nice if you could come and we could highlight you at the Commission meeting and we could take pictures with their metals and stuff like that.”
Maloy said she submitted financial statements for the Commission’s consideration on the matter along with an invoice from Enterprise for the rental of the van. In total, Maloy requested $1,896 to cover the van rental, $500 deposit on the van and hotel costs for 8 athletes. Rosenau said the county could not fund the deposit due to accounting procedures, but made a motion to approve the donation of $1,396 to the organization to fund the trip with the request that the Commission be supplied with receipts for the van and hotel stay for accounting purposes.
The next meeting of the Tucker County Commission will be held September 13th at 9 a.m. at the Tucker County Courthouse Old Courtroom in Parsons.