Local Scouts, students, leaders in D.C. for inaugural events

WASHINGTON

Chase Weiland, a 17-year-old Lordstown High School senior, is eager to see Donald Trump get sworn in as president today, but not too thrilled about the wait.

“I’m very excited about the event, but not excited that we’ll be standing for about six hours,” she said. “But we’re going to be watching history happen. It’s going to be memorable.”

Weiland is one of the dozens of Mahoning Valley residents who made the trip to Washington, D.C., for Trump’s inauguration today.

Weiland is a member of the Lordstown High School Political History Club that sent 17 students with 10 adult chaperones to Washington.

The group left Tuesday and has visited various historic landmarks in the nation’s capital.

Terry Armstrong, Lordstown schools superintendent and one of the adult chaperones, said the group will leave its hotel at 4 a.m. Friday and head to the inauguration. The gates open at 6:30 a.m. for the noon swearing-in.

A group of eight Boy Scouts and seven adult leaders and parents from Boy Scout Troop 60 in Boardman arrived Thursday in the D.C. area to attend today’s swearing-in.

The troop camped overnight at Cherry Hill Park Campground in College Park, Md., the closest campground to D.C., and will head to the event around 6:30-7 a.m.

Meanwhile, close to 200 people attended a Thursday fundraiser co-hosted by Bruce Zoldan, chief executive officer of B.J. Alan Co. in Youngstown, for football great Jim Brown’s Amer-I-Can inner-city outreach program at the request of Trump and the president-elect’s transition team.

The $1,000-a-ticket event’s signature cocktails included a play on words: Trumpini, Mexican Wallbanger and Putin’s Moscow Hacking Mule.

Read more about locals at the national events in Friday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.