By Selwyn Harris

Some local elementary school students are benefiting from generous acts of local businesses and members of the community.

The Pahrump Nugget on Monday donated much needed school supplies to the local organization known as “Save our Schools.”

Nye County Chief Juvenile Probation Officer Tom Metscher received the items during a brief presentation ceremony from Nugget and Golden Gaming officials this week.

Metscher said the donations of backpacks, binders, and various supplies was a wonderful gesture and is greatly appreciated.

“Golden Gaming with their three properties went on a school supply drive and have been collecting items for a few weeks now and were anxious to make a contribution to students within our community. From my understanding they collected from the properties from the patrons that come in and out of there and they did a great job putting those together and I believe they are all going to Manse Elementary School,” he said.

Metscher also noted that there are too many local kids who do not have the luxury to return to school with new supplies, which is why the donations were so important at this time.

“This is certainly a blessing and it shows how giving the community is once again for the kids at school. Every bit and every contribution counts and it is pretty cool to see,” he said.

Golden Gaming’s Liz Cory along with Nugget General Manager Jeremy Jensen made the presentation to Metscher on Monday.

Cory said Golden Gaming is always proud to do what they can to help those in the local community who are less fortunate than others are.

“In the forefront of our minds we are always trying to keep up with community involvement. We are trying always to do things to give back. We reached out to the community for donations to our schools because the kids need our support and they need new supplies to go back to school. We had a really good turnout. We promoted it for about two weeks and a lot of people brought in a lot of supplies. They were not only guests, but employees donated too so it was really nice,” she said.

Jensen meanwhile noted that the idea of holding the drive was a no-brainer in terms of assisting the valley’s students.

“We try to help as much as we can. You can’t touch everyone but we are definitely out there doing the best that we can,” he said.

Nye County School District Superintendent Dale Norton said he is not surprised with the outpouring of support shown for local school kids in town.

“Tom Metscher contacted me and said the Nugget finished the drive and they got a bunch of school supplies. Of course we always appreciate that and we will coordinate an effort to get them to the students. We really appreciate all of those efforts not only from the Nugget and Golden Gaming but all of the organizations and all of the people that help us out and help our kids out that’s the bottom line. The kids,” he said.

Dozens of various items were collected for the students which will be distributed within the next several days.