On July 4, a schoolyard in Perry County disappeared. School district officials asked the public to help figure out why.
When someone removed playground equipment from Buckhorn Elementary School, Perry County School District officials took to social media to ask for help solving the mystery.
“The school district has been notified that someone removed the student’s playground from Buckhorn school grounds,” the district said in a Facebook post Thursday. “According to the contractor, the playground was removed today, July 4th. Students will return in a few weeks and we are looking for details on how this happened.”
“It is important that anyone with information regarding this matter contact Director Jennifer Hickerson as soon as possible,” the message said.
Shortly after, on Thursday, the school administrators posted another message:
“Wow. Thanks for the quick response. We have some more details on the removal of the playground. It appears that it was sold by the city of Buckhorn (village) via an advertised bid. This was not a case of stolen property, but a matter of ownership and communication.
“We are planning meetings next week to try to rectify the situation.”
After a woman posted that she had purchased the playground from the school district for a neighborhood park, district officials responded: “Perry County Schools did not enter into a transaction to sell the playground, and that has been resolved with the buyer.”
Perry County Superintendent Kent Campbell told the Herald-Leader in an email Thursday night that “unfortunately this is all the information I have at this time and I hope to meet with City of Buckhorn officials soon.”
Buckhorn city officials were not immediately available for comment Thursday.
Campbell confirmed that Buckhorn students have not used the building since it was damaged in the flooding that hit the southeastern Kentucky region in 2022.
“The Buckhorn School has been housed in the former A.B. Combs Elementary building for the past two years and they will be returning home once school resumes,” Campbell told the Herald-Leader
He said there was no water damage to the playground, “other than normal cleaning of the mud.”
“We had plans to add some additional play equipment, but we also wanted to utilize what was already there,” Campbell said.
