When severe weather struck across the state Wednesday, the storm shelter at Athens High School was unofficially open to the public for anyone seeking shelter.

Athens City Board of Education members used the phrase “unofficially open” during the group’s meeting Thursday because the site is not officially recognized by the county as a storm shelter.

The location inside AHS is the officially designated area for students, faculty and staff to use if and when severe weather occurs during school hours, however.

Board President Russell Johnson said schools built these days are required to have such an area available. He said it has always been the Board’s intention to eventually make the space available as a public storm shelter when the need arises.

“From the beginning, we always said we wanted a public shelter,” Johnson said. “We’ve got to get other people to help us man it. We didn’t have the budget to pay someone to come up here at 2 a.m. and open it. Those are things we are still trying to work through.”

Superintendent Beth Patton echoed Johnson’s sentiment on wanting the school shelter open to the public.

That said, the shelter can only be open to the public when students are not present in the shelter. Such was the case Wednesday, as school was deemed online-only ahead of the weather, so students were not on campus.

“We will never open it to the public when we have students in there, because there is no way to vet who is coming in and out,” Johnson said.

Patton said around 25 people used the shelter Wednesday, though no severe weather ended up hitting Athens. She said Mike O’Rear, student services supervisor for ACS, who oversees safety and discipline, came to the school and opened the shelter for anyone who wished to use it.

The Board named O’Rear the shelter coordinator during Thursday’s meeting.

Land for sale

Thursday’s meeting ended with an executive session and a vote. The Board chose unanimously to appoint Ming Commercial Real Estate Group to market a piece of property owned by ACS near the central office.

“Waffle House had shown interest in this land in the past, but because of COVID-19, that didn’t work out,” he said. “There are still people interested, so we are letting Ming market it for us.”