Riverside Elementary Moves Back in

[Guest guest]

Happy to be homeKing volunteers help teachers move back into repaired classroomsSunday January 20, 2002 By Tara TuckwillerSTAFF WRITER PINEVILLE — One thing survived the July flood that wiped out Durham’s fourth-grade classroom: A red-painted plywood apple. It’s hanging on her door. Chipped, but still cheery. “I got this before they could throw it away,†Durham said. “I thought, this is not going to mold. I took it.†Everything else — desks, books, a giant bowl full of lollipops — is new. For four months, Durham taught class in a rented trailer, but now her old Riverside Elementary classroom is finally fit for human occupation. She moved in Friday, with the help of dozens of volunteers who chose to spend the Luther King Jr. Day weekend working, not relaxing. Some of them plan to return Monday to finish up other rooms. By the time kids return Tuesday, it will look as if the flood never ripped through the school. But it did. “There was a hole in the parking lot 30 feet wide and at least 8 to 10 feet deep,†Durham said. “The water was clear up to the bottom of the window.†That would have been over Durham’s head. “I just stood here and cried. “At least there were no kids in here at the time. That’s something to be grateful for.†Christy , an Americorps program director in ton, got 38 volunteers to help at Riverside on Friday. No other school in Wyoming County was hit worse by the flood. “We got a vanload [of volunteers] from town, one from ton, and then local people,†said. In national service programs like ’s, Luther King Jr. Day is a mandatory service day. Some of the volunteers who return today will go to Mullens, to help organize warehouses full of donated items for flood victims. Others will stay at Riverside, to assemble the cafeteria. “There was 3 feet of water in this room,†Principal Joe said of the cafeteria, ushering visitors through a new corridor alongside it. The old corridor was blown apart by the force of the floodwaters. So the county renovated an unused cafeteria and kitchen in the old junior high next door, and the Riverside cooks had been using that. But to get there, children had to walk outside up a steep hill, which got icy in the winter. “One morning, the custodian and I just stood there and held each kid’s hand†as they walked down the hill, said. Added , “Debbie Boley, one of the kindergarten teachers, said it seemed like all they got done all day was taking coats on and off.†The school had several inches of water in it one time before, decades ago. It’s still in the floodplain, and if Pineville ever flooded again, Riverside would certainly suffer. For now, the floors are spotless for the first time since July. The desks are in neat rows, and the rooms are decorated with brand-new globes and paint and “Wonderful Winter†bulletin boards. Outside the school’s walls, bulldozers are still excavating caved-in hillsides, and flood-ruined houses still teeter on the edge of the river. To contact staff writer Tara Tuckwiller, use e-mail or call 348-5189.http://sundaygazettemail.com/news/Valley+%26+State/200201192/