Like most planned events in this area during the past 10 days or so, the largest single fundraising effort of the year for the Clinton County High School Basketball Boosters Club – the WANY Radio Auction, was rescheduled from it’s original date last Friday night and will instead be held this coming Saturday night, February 28.

Also due to the inclement weather Albany and Clinton County has experienced with the massive snow storm and frigid temperatures, the entire format of the event has also been changed again, according to information given to the Clinton County News last weekend.

Booster Club President Kim Gibson told the Clinton County News that the auction this Saturday night will now revert back to the traditional format the program has used for the past several years, beginning at 5:00 p.m. Saturday, and continuing until the normal station sign-off at 10:00 p.m.

Previous plans to shorten the auction and incorporate a bar-b-que dinner and reverse raffle in the gymnasium to lead into the live auction, have now been put on hold and the group hopes to organize and hold the dinner and reverse raffle as a separate event at a later date.

Gibson said that although some of the raffle tickets had already been sold by Booster Club members, those ticket purchases would be refunded within the next few days and ticket sales to the dinner and raffle would start new when a date for the fundraiser was determined.

Last weekend’s original date for the fundraising effort was changed when the snow event that left the area blanketed under several inches of snow, forced CCHS athletic department officials to cancel a home double-header basketball game against Barren County.

It was hoped that the weather conditions would break enough to be able to make up that night of basketball on either Friday or Saturday night, but Barren County determined that they would not be able to make the trip on either date.

The end result is that now, the WANY Radio Auction will revert back to it’s original five-hour long format, between 5:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m., and will follow this week’s 16th District Tournament being held at Edmonton’s Metcalfe County High School.

District tournament competition, which also saw it’s opening rounds of play moved back one day to a Tuesday and Wednesday start, will conclude this week with the girls’ championship game being played on Thursday night (7:00 p.m.) and the boys championship game being played on Friday night (7:00 p.m.).

The tournament start schedule was changed due to weather related problems in Edmonton when freezing temperatures caused several water lines to break inside the Metcalfe County High School structure and the extra day was needed in order to give crews there more time to make repairs and complete clean-up tasks.

As for the Saturday night radio auction, long-time co-host Al Gibson said he hopes that the long stretch of bad weather conditions that local residents have suffered through will actually play out in favor of the fundraising event.

“Everyone has been couped inside and by now eager for something to do, and I hope getting involved with this weekend’s radio auction proves to be the therapy we are all looking for,” Gibson said this week. “While we want a good, active radio audience, I’m expecting the in-house audience to be one of our largest ever – simply because of the bad weather we have all just suffered through.”

Gibson will once again be joined during the auction by his long-time co-host, Jackie Flowers.

The program is based from the cafeteria at Clinton County High School and featured over the radio airwaves of local station WANY (100.9 FM).

The program can also be heard on local access channel 16 for television subscribers of local cable provider MediaCom.

The radio auction portion of the program will be conducted as it has for the past several years, with program hosts and workers choosing groups of donated items and services to offer for auction in specified segment lengths of on-the-air stretches.

During each segment, callers listening on the radio, as well as those in the audience attending the auction in person, will be bidding against each other hoping to finish with the winning bid.

The basic premise of the auction is unchanged from years past, with a group of three or more items or services being described over the air and listed on a large bulletin board at the cafeteria for segments that usually last for just three minutes.

Bidders calling in over the phone or in person, can continue to raise the bids on items until the segment ends, winning bidders are announced and the process starts all over again.

To keep the process fair to those bidders calling in over the telephones, the final 30 seconds of each segment is always reserved for telephone bids only, which is the most effective way to keep in-house bidders from having the biggest advantage and being able to “snipe” bids at the last instant.

In addition to Gibson and Flowers, the radio auction is also supported by a staff of volunteer workers from the Booster Club membership as well as community leaders who stop by each year to lend a hand.

Even the athletes who ultimately benefit the most from the radio auction will be getting in on the act, as bidders who call in to place bids over the telephone, will find they are actually talking to team members from the Lady Bulldog and Bulldog basketball squads who traditionally work the telephones during the program.

The lineup of items and services that will be offered at Friday night’s radio auction will, of course, be as varied and interesting as it has ever been, normally ranging from clothing to health and personal services to furniture and tools and from time to time, even pets and livestock.

While the majority of the items and services that will be offered for sale during the program are smaller, inexpensive and certainly affordable, there are always several items that are promoted as “special” items and are featured for extended segment runs and usually garner higher prices.

Those items can range from houseboat or pontoon boat rentals to handmade items or even antiques or collectibles.

The radio auction is designed as a way to raise funds to help with expenses associated with the varsity basketball program in Clinton County.

The premise behind the Booster Club and the fundraising events is to give the small high school program a boost in providing things to it’s student-athletes that might not otherwise be possible on an often strained athletic budget.

While larger schools in larger communities and cities are often able to go the extra mile, smaller programs like the one here often work on shoestring budgets and additional fundraising efforts such as the ones planned for this weekend are just one attempt at reaching for some status of financial equality with the larger programs.

Gibson also noted again this year that the auction event is always a reminder of how well the community comes together for a common cause, especially when the youth of the community is concerned.

The items that are auctioned off during the program Friday night have been donated to the effort by local business owners, professionals and individuals who always step forward with fantastic offerings that make the effort a tremendous success each and every year.

During the program, the items being sold during each segment will be on display for viewing by those attending the auction, while radio listeners will have the on-the-air descriptions of Gibson and Flowers.

Segments usually have a well mixed offering of items up for sale, with some items bringing a few dollars while others can fetch hundreds of dollars – often during the same three minute span.

Items that will be sold Friday night can be picked up during or after the auction at the C.C.H.S. cafeteria that night for awhile following the end of the program, and an additional pick-up day will also be announced throughout the program for those who can’t make it out Friday night.

While most of the items being sold will actually be on hand for pick-up by the winning bidders, other items and services that have been sold will involve gift certificates that can be taken to the vendor.

Home listeners/bidders enjoying the program over the WANY broadcast are reminded that only one telephone number is necessary with the multi-line “roll-over” system in use at Clinton County High School, and the telephone number that will be used Friday night is (606) 387-5569.

Bidders using the telephone will be asked to state a bid amount as well as the caller’s name.

If a caller is out-bid by another caller or in-house bidder during a particular segment, then placing a new bid is as simple as making another phone call and placing a new bid on the item.

When bidding has ended on a group of featured items, new items are then presented and described, and the process starts over again.