GoFundMe campaign collects more than $22,000 for Encinitas custodian

A GoFundMe campaign for an Encinitas school custodian who needed his foot and part of his leg amputated has raised more than $22,000 from nearly 400 donors as of this week. It’s goal is $25,000.

Guil Aguilar, the night custodian at Park Dale Lane Elementary School in the Encinitas Union School District, was bitten by a poisonous spider at work, according to the fundraiser’s online page. He will be out indefinitely, and the funds will help provide for his family while he recovers.

According to a Dec. 8 update, Aguilar started physical therapy to learn how to balance.

Park Dale Lane fourth grade teacher Melissa Scharbarth, who started the GoFundMe campaign, wrote that he was “in good spirits” and his family “beyond thankful and so blown away by all the comments and donations from our community.”

“I can’t even begin to imagine what he and his family must be going through right now, and when hardships arise, our community is best known for being uplifting and supportive,” Scharbarth wrote on the GoFundMe page.

For more information, visit gofundme.com/f/guil039s-comfort-campaign.

--Report by Luke Harold