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Randolph County Board of Commissioners

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Commissioners approve opening of bids for renovations to Human Services Building and Wellness Clinic

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday, June 5, with multiple property matters on the agenda.

The board first approved a waiver of the American Healthcare Systems annual debt with regard to the Rural Healthcare Stabilization loan from UNC Health.

“The terms of the agreement we have with the state are pretty well fixed,” said Assistant County Manager Will Massie. “We owe $1 million a year plus 1% interest. The way the pass-through agreement with the hospital read was that the board would consider the compliance with the terms of the contract.”

The board had initially expressed concerns with the way AHS’ administration had been operating in conjunction with Randolph Health, but after improvements were made to transparency and regulations, the board was satisfied.

“The spirit and intent, I think, has been met,” said Commissioner David Allen. “We want to see everybody succeed. Based on our last meeting, where it was very much the spirit and intent to have a functioning board, I think the spirit of intent has been met with all these requirements.”

The money obtained from the loan is intended strictly for capital purchase and can not be used for daily operations.

The board also approved the final design of the Human Services Building in Archdale from Smith Sinnett Architecture and opened the project up for bids.

The renovations in the base bid involve improvements to the upper level, including 24 private offices – 19 for DSS and five for DPH – a secure DPH suite, shared reception and waiting area, dedicated public restroom, large DSS work room, and shared break room and conference room.

If the base bids come in and funding for alternates is still available, the plan also includes potential options for renovations of the lower level, including 25 additional DSS offices, a break room, a conference room, and a small work area.

The estimated budget cost for the base bid renovations is $1,508,150, the alternate option for renovation to the lower level is $1,043,150, and an alternate option for parking lot seal coat and striping is $25,000, for a total projected construction cost of $2,576,300.

“We think this is a good building to reuse for the purposes,” said Robert Carmac of Smith Sinnett Architecture. “We’ve tried to maximize every possible way. We have strived to find every way in this building to drive the cost down. To reuse, to maximize this building as an asset.”

The project is projected to begin in August or September with an 8-12 month timeline for construction.

Along with the DHS building renovations, the final design of the Wellness Clinic at Northgate was also approved and opened up for bids.

The renovation plan includes an additional five exam rooms, an overflow room, two offices, secure reception and waiting area, supply storage, pharmacy storage, a dedicated lab, a drug screening toilet in lab and a separate public restroom.

According to the plan by SmithSinnett, construction is projected to start in August with a 5-6 month completion window.

“I think it looks like a good location for this,” said Commissioner Hope Haywood. “I think in the long run it’s going to save us dollars, and I think the payoff will be to the benefit of our employees’ health and wellbeing.”

The board then held a public hearing about a potential economic development partnership for the Seagrove I-74 Truckstop, Pump Station and Force Main.

“Love’s Truck Stop has shown interest in this location, however, due to the sewer capacity at Seagrove, they’ve been unable to commit to the site,” said Paxton Arthurs. “If the proposed pump station can be routed to the Uwharrie Pump Station, which is supposed to be sent to Asheboro, then they’ve agreed to move forward with the project.”

Along with the sewer agreement, the proposal also includes an agreement from the county to fund $300,000 of the $800,000 projected total cost for the project through state-issued ARPA funds.

Following the hearing, the board approved the request.

The second hearing was for the county to act to approve the NC Railroad Grant for Ace Avant.

“In addition to supporting our existing industries throughout Randolph County by showing our appreciation for those industries and their commitment to our community, providing workforce development programs, and attracting and recruiting new industry to create jobs and spread that tax base, the EDC is also tasked with identifying potential development of industrial sites and buildings throughout Randolph County for the purposes of attracting new companies to our community,” said EDC Business Recruitment Director Crystal Gettys “The Highway 311 South site consists of 67.6 acres owned by Ace Avant and is already zoned Industrial Use with a potential of being rail served.

“The North Carolina Railroad Grant is a performance-based grant, and so the property must ultimately be conveyed to an industrial rail user. If the property is sold to a non-rail user, the grant provisions require the repayment of all or a portion of the grant.”

However, Ace Avant has already agreed to be responsible for any paybacks should the sale not go through to a rail user.

With that stipulation, the board agreed to grant the grant following the hearing.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet July 10.

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Board of Commissioners presented with design for Health Department renovations

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday, February 6, where they were provided updates on two of the county’s major construction projects.

The first item of new business was an update on the Health Department renovations.

“Last summer, you awarded a contract to Smith Sinett Architecture to design a renovation to the health department, which is located at the Ira McDowell Center,” said County Engineer Paxton Arthurs. “Since that time, Smith Sinett has worked to finalize the design and put together the bid documents.”

The current Health Department space is 16,000 square feet, with 35 offices, two dental offices, ten general exam rooms, a pharmacy, a laboratory, and supply storage.

“The building was built in the early ‘80s to the best that we can determine, so it’s about 40 years old,” said Robert Carmac of Smith Sinett. “During that time, it only had some minor renovations. No major renovations, improvements, or reorganizations of the space have happened since then, so it’s badly needed to improve the workflow.”

The new projected site plan will feature three additional offices, an independent dental suite with three additional exam rooms, six additional general exam rooms, additional and organized storage, a dedicated check-in/check-out area, one additional break room, a fitness room, and secured circulation corridors.

The project is split into seven alternative phases, with the base bid coming in at $1.718 million. With all the additions, the construction cost comes out to $2.483 million, and with all the fees added, the total project budget would be $2.895 million.

“One of the reasons we’ve laid this project out the way we did is one: to help with the budget,” Carmac said. “We know that there’s going to be multiple funding sources for this project, so we’ve staggered this into seven alternates to allow budget flexibility and allow this project to come in budget whether we get all seven or just one or two parts.”

According to Carmac, the projected completion date would be April 2024.

After the presentation, the board authorized county staff to advertise the project for bids.

The board was also given an update on the Farm Food and Family Education Center.

“The architects have just completed the design and development phase of the Farm Food and Family Education Center,” said Cooperative Extension Director Kenny Sherin. “The latest estimate actually came down a little bit from the schematic development phase. Several factors, but the architects and engineers have been working very hard to find cost-cutting measures. They were able to reduce the cost down to $28.9 million. We have secured $28.3 million, so we just need an additional $600,000 to meet the current estimate.”

The final action that the board took was the setting of a public hearing as the first step in abolishing and restructuring the final six fire districts in the county.

“Until recently, fire departments in Randolph County had their tax rates capped at a $0.15 rate, and that’s because of how they were formed and when they were formed,” said Associate County Attorney Aimee Scotton. “Based upon needs expressed by several of our fire departments and the expectation that more would need that in the future, we began abolishing the current capped districts and recreating them without the cap.”

The final six districts that will be restructured are the Coleridge-Erect, Fair Grove, Farmer, Julian, Northeast, and Staley Fire Districts.

The new districts will be exactly the same size and area but will give fire departments the option to raise their tax rate if necessary. This decision itself is not a tax increase.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet March 6.

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Commissioners resworn in, positions approved for new cycle

ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday, where the board had select members resworn in and updates on various county projects were provided.

Commissioners Darrell Frye, David Allen, and Hope Haywood – all of whom won reelection back in November – were resworn into their positions. Following that, the board also voted to reappoint Frye as the chairman of the board and Allen as the vice chair.

Other positions that were voted in were the reappointment of Ben Morgan as the county attorney, Dana Crisco as clerk to the board, and Sarah Pack as deputy clerk to the board.

The other board representative positions were all reappointed en masse, the only difference being a change to the representative to the Animal Services Advisory Board. Both Frye and Allen served on it as a newly formed board, but moving forward, only Allen will continue those duties.

The board was then briefed on a potential partnership between the health department and Kintegra Family Dentistry.

“The health department has provided much-needed dental services for many, many years,” said Public Health Director Tara Aker. “Probably for the last six to eight years, though, we’ve had difficulty finding full-time dentists. There’s just not enough dentists to go around, and a public health department has a really hard time recruiting and retaining a dentist because we just can’t compete with a private practice.”

According to Aker, Randolph County has been unable to recruit and retain a dentist on staff and so to help meet demand, they have decided to partner with Kintegra Family Dentistry.

“Our plan is for Kintegra Family Dental, which is a part of a federally qualified health center, to come into our health department, and they will be taking over our dental clinic and providing staff and equipment to continue the services that are needed here in the county,” Aker said.

“The key is partnership,” said Kintegra Family Dentistry Chief Dental Officer Dr. William Donigan. “Kintegra is the largest federally qualified health center in the state of North Carolina. Our dental program last year saw 35,000 patient visits. Our school-based learning program is the largest in the state, and last year, with two mobile units, we saw over 6,000 children in the schools. We have seven fixed brick-and-mortar sites, and now we’ve added a third mobile dental unit. And we just purchased, for Randolph County, a three-chair mobile dentistry unit because we want to get into those schools where we can help reach them. The purpose of the whole partnership is to serve the people of Randolph County.”

According to Aker, the estimated go date for the restart of the county dental services with Kintegra is February 1.

The board was also given an update on the historic courthouse museum project.

As the design stage of the project started, the scope of it began to increase with a focus on the additions of improved accessibility in and out, improved egress from the building, replacement of outdated building systems, and addressing water intrusion in the basement, according to Hobbs Architects Principal and Architect Chevon Moore.

According to Moore, while the last estimate was $2.88 million, additions to the project and inflation have affected the price estimate, bringing the estimated total project cost up to $3.44 million. Moore also said that construction is projected to begin in early May, with a construction schedule of 12 months.

“This is not what we would say in any typical time,” Moore said. “We would think in a typical time, this would be more along the lines of nine months for this construction scope, but given the lead times for particular items, we would recommend assuming a 12-month schedule.”

The board also held the public hearings for the third set of fire district restructurings to remove the 15-cent tax cap from them.

“Many of our current fire protection tax districts still have a 15-cent cap,” said Associate County Attorney Aimee Scotton. “You have moved forward on eliminating that cap for several districts, and this is our third group. At your October meeting, you officially considered moving forward to abolish the currently capped county service districts for fire protection for Bennett, Seagrove, Southwest, and Ulah and replacing them with districts that do not have a cap on taxation. The proposed new service districts contain the exact same properties that are currently contained in the capped districts that they would be replacing.”

“This is not a tax increase. It simply gives the ability for these departments to ask for taxes in excess of 15 cents, but any request would still come before the board as they always do for any other manner.”

The board approved the restructuring of each of the four districts and the Building Reuse Grant for Mid-State Trailers.

“Mid-State Trailers was recently acquired back in the spring by ITZ, Inc., who will continue to do business as Mid-State Trailers,” said Economic Development Corporation Business Recruitment Director Crystal Gettys. “ITZ took over the manufacturing of trailers from Mid-State, and they will be adding their own Handy Ramp line to the production.”

“The company anticipates investing $527,829 in property and will be creating 19 new jobs paying an average wage of $46,967. This is well above our current average wage for Randolph County. The company is seeking and qualifies for a Reuse grant in the amount of $100,000. There is no anticipated match for Randolph County; however, the company investment certainly covers the traditional 5% that used to be required.”

Finally, the board approved the formation of an Executive Committee of Opioid Settlement Funding and appointed the Juvenile Day Reporting Center director, DSS director, Randolph County Emergency Management chief, the Adult Day Reporting Center director, Sandhills representative, Sheriff’s Office representative, assistant health director, and health director as voting members of the committee, with the county manager as an ex officio member.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet January 2.

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Board of Commissioners approves funding for four SRO positions for elementary schools

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday to deliver their decision on how to allocate $600,00 in state funding. In addition, the board also approved four new SRO positions for the county elementary schools.

First up on the agenda for the board was a presentation on the Children’s Home Society Study results.

“Back in November of 2021, the Randolph County Partnership for Children requested funding for an early childhood community survey in order to more effectively identify the needs of children and caregivers in Randolph County,” said commissioner Hope Haywood. “The partnership used for this survey was the Institute for Families, a division of the Children’s Home Society of North Carolina. This organization has had a presence in Randolph County for over 40 years, and their reputation is sterling.”

The study focused on four key areas: an analysis of population and DSS health data, an environmental scan for tools, resources, and supports already in the community, interviews with over 100 residents of Randolph County involving caregivers and community influencers, and a media analysis.

“There are three things that are the most important to take away tonight,” said Children’s Home Society Representative Donna Wood. “First and foremost, families in Randolph County are increasingly overburdened. Particularly around economic hardship and transportation. The second is that the increased needs of families are driving child welfare, foster care, and county expenses up. And the third and most important, in my opinion, is that Randolph County residents can come together to change this pattern. Throughout this process, it was evident what a wonderful community Randolph County is and how much residents care. It was very clear that this trend is likely due to people not knowing how they can be part of a solution as opposed to not wanting to be.”

The board was also presented with the annual update from their partnership with Waste Management.

“Since June of 2014, when we got the contract, we have contributed almost $13 million to Randolph County,” said Waste Management Governmental Relations Bob Peeler. “The past fiscal year, the annual payment with CPI was $1,214,063, and a couple of years ago, you approved a daily tonnage increase, and because of that, this past fiscal year, it brought in another $301,793. In addition, over that period of time, we have paid almost $6 million in solid waste taxes to the State of North Carolina.”

Following those updates, the board approved a series of community funding allocations using state funds brought forth by NC Senator Dave Craven.

“The citizens hear about the large investments we make from the state in our communities, but sometimes we have needs that don’t quite make it to the top of everybody’s list,” Craven said. “So tonight, we’re here to make some appropriations. The state sent the county $600,000 to look at some of these areas.”

The allocations include $25,000 for Experience Liberty, $50,000 for Your Choices Randolph, $50,000 for Randolph County United Way, $10,000 for Farmer Civitan Club, $20,000 for RC Family Crisis Center in conjunction with Emmy’s House, $20,000 for Randolph County Sheriff’s Office, $10,000 for Asheboro Downtown Development, $20,000 for Randolph County Crime Stoppers, $10,000 for Our Daily Bread Soup Kitchen, $20,000 for Randolph County Animal Shelter, $20,000 for Honoring Our Veteran’s, $5,000 for Asheboro Raiders Youth Football Program, $5,000 for Ramseur Food Pantry, $5,000 for Randolph County Honor Guard, $20,000 for Petty Family Foundation, $10,000 for Habitat for Humanity, and $10,00 in unrestricted grants for all municipal and volunteer fire departments totaling $200,000.

The board then approved a contract with mkSolutions Inc. of York, PA, for a cost of $125,875 with a $4,955 year two maintenance cost for the Library RFID project. The project is funded with a federal Library Services and Technology Act grant and a local match.

“We are getting a project underway to streamline our handling of library material through radio frequency identification of items, or RFID for short,” said Library Director Ross Holt. “We’ll place a short-range radio tag on each book, DVD, audiobook, and other items. This will allow multiple items to be handled, checked out, checked in, and processed in a single, hands-free transaction. You place a stack of items on a sensitized plate, and they’re checked out or checked back in. Inventory is as easy as waving a wand across a shelf of books.”

“One of the big benefits of RFID to the patrons is self-checkout which will be offered at each library, although staff assistance will always be available. We also expect to see a significant saving of staff time. This will enable us to redeploy staff to more substantive interactions with patrons. Our intent is to shift more staffing hours to the mobile library, which is very much in demand.”

The board also approved a request from the Randolph County Sheriff’s Department for four deputy sheriff positions for Elementary School SROs.

“We have some of the greatest schools that you guys have approved, and the county has built with state-of-the-art technology that is safer now than other times, but when I was growing up, we didn’t have the need for SROs, and that didn’t come until 1994,” said Captain Brian Arrington. “As time changes, the community and the sheriff’s office agree that we need to change with it, and if violence is going to present itself to our schools, we need to prepare to fight it to keep it away from the kids of Randolph County.”

“Since January 1 of this year, not counting the two and half months we were not in school, our SROs have taken over 675 reports or supplements of reports just in our county schools. So, the number of occurrences that law enforcement is needed in these schools has gone up dramatically. We get the job done with the number of officers we have, but we could better cover and provide better safety for the kids of Randolph County if we could add these four officers.”

The approved positions come at a total cost of $384,004, of which Randolph County Schools has agreed to pay $238,003.

“What’s the cost of one incident?” said commissioner Maxton McDowell. “We don’t want to pay that price.”

The board also approved the purchase of five Ford Police Interceptors and 10 Dodge Chargers at a total cost of $528,745 for the Randolph County Sheriff’s Office.

Finally, the board approved the purchase of approximately 2.5 acres of property for $76,398 in order to help facilitate the construction of a pump station and force main for the I-74 site project.

“Back in March, you had awarded a contract to the Wooten Company to design the pump station and force main serving the I-74 site,” said County Engineer Paxton Arthurs. “At that time, it was only for this site. However, in June, you approved an amendment to the contract to expand the pump station to serve the entire sewer basin. This was done to provide for future development. At that time, Randleman was going to provide water to the site, and all the sewer was going to be pumped south to Asheboro. Randleman had the capacity to provide for the site. However, it would use up all their capacity. So in order to preserve some of that, they were going to let the sewer go to Asheboro. However, recently we learned that Deep River Dyeing has closed. This was Randleman’s largest water and sewer customer, and because of the impact this is going to have on their budget, they have asked for the water and sewer to go to Randleman, and Asheboro is in agreement with this.”

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet December 5.

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Lumos selected as recipient of GREAT grant in Randolph Co.

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday to discuss the plans for the expansion of broadband fiber, land reappraisal, and the restructuring of four of the county’s fire districts.

The board approved an amended Memorandum of Understanding with Lumos, formerly Northstate, for the payment of $50,000 as a county-match for the expansion of fiber broadband in Randolph County.

“The expansion of broadband is a big issue for our county, for our state, and our association has been lobbying for that,” said Chairman Darrell Frye. “This has been a number one priority for counties all over North Carolina, and therefore it is eligible for ARPA funding. That is what will be used for Randolph County’s $50,000 match.”

While Lumos was already committed to the expansion of broadband services in Randolph County, according to their Senior Director of Marketing Derek Kelly, they were also selected as the recipient of the GREAT Grant in Randolph County, which helps bring high-speed internet to North Carolinians, businesses and farms in the most rural and remote areas of the state.

“We announced we’re going to build fiber to a million homes over the next five years with our own funding, and the grant stuff just kind of gets added on top of that,” Kelly said. “We announced that we are making a $51 million investment in Randolph County and western Winston-Salem. The Randolph County portion of that is about 15,000 homes that we’re going to be building fiber to in Asheboro, which is about a $15 to $20 million investment that we’re making outside of any of the grant programs. So we’re actively working on that, and we’ll be starting construction in the coming months.”

The board was also given a presentation on the Critical Incident Stress Management program in Randolph County and its importance to first responders and emergency management staff.

“I want to present to you what critical stress management is and what it means for our county,” said Emergency Management Coordinator Major Christie McCorquodale. “Research shows that first responders appear to be at increased risk for suicide. Firefighters and law enforcement officers are more likely to die by suicide than in the line of duty. EMS clinicians are more likely to take their own lives than general members of the public. Public safety communicators are also at risk as well. Studies have found that nearly one quarter experience depression and that as many as 24% have symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.”

The program aims to provide peer-to-peer consultation as well as support through multiple formats for those in critically stressful environments.

“For many years, Christie has worked passionately and tirelessly to foster this program that’s making a huge impact on the mental health and wellbeing of our first responders,” said Wellness Administrator Sam Varner. “We’ve been working with Christie over the last year to really expand this program and to help it make a difference in what we deem our other ‘high-stress’ departments.”

The board of commissioners then set a public hearing for a proposed schedule of true-values of land reappraisal for November 7.

In 2021, the Randolph County Board of Commissioners adopted a four-year reappraisal cycle rather than the traditional eight-year cycle, which advanced the reappraisal from 2025 to 2023.

“The primary goal of a reappraisal is uniformity and fairness,” said Tax Administrator Debra Hill. “The process is not to increase revenue or provide tax breaks but to fairly, equally, and uniformly appraise real property at its true value in money. We don’t make the market; we follow the market.”

The process of restructuring the Fire Districts in Randolph County to remove the 15-cent tax rate cap in the districts also continued with another four new districts brought before the board, following the previous eight that had already been restructured.

The board set a public hearing for the Bennett, Seagrove, Southwest, and Ulah Fire Districts restructuring for December 5.

These fire departments will still cover the same areas, and the only change will be that they will no longer have to be held to a 15-cent fire tax cap. However, the departments still need to have board approval first to actually increase taxes.

“The creation of a new county service district does not change the current fire tax rate, nor does it guarantee an increase in said rate,” Frye said. “The County Commissioners shall continue to set tax rates in the same manner as before.”

The board approved a 48-day extension as well as a $100,000 increase to the owner’s contingency for the Detention Center project and the transfer of $1,192,972 of unused funds from the Trinity Middle School Project to the Northwest Randolph Human Services Center Capital Project.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet November 7.

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Fire Marshal’s Office to start charging for specific services

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Tuesday, September 6, with the Fire Marshal’s Office’s request for a new fee schedule, the fire district reformatting, and the purchase of property for the I-74 Industrial Site; the key items on the agenda for consideration.

The Fire Marshal’s Office brought forth a request before the board to add a fee schedule to some of the services that the office provides.

“Since the inception of the North Carolina Fire Code in the early 1990s, Randolph County Fire Marshal’s Office has provided permit consultation, plan review, and specialty inspections services free of charge to contractors and the like,” said Fire Marshal Erik Beard. “Randolph County is one of the few counties in the state that had not charged for these services.”

However, due to the growing volume of requests that the Fire Marshal’s office has received, around 3,000 inspection activities, and 700-800 specialty inspections per year, the office has requested that they start charging for these services.

According to Beard, the office will not charge for annual and routine inspections and only would have an instituted fee if there were issues with violations not being corrected in a timely manner.

“We’re not looking at it so much from a revenue standpoint as much as just recouping costs,” Beard said.

The board was given an update on the status of the Farm, Food, and Family Education Center.

“We are actively working on the project, and we have completed the schematic design for the first phase of the design,” said Kristen Hess of HH Architecture. “This reflects a long schedule, and, as you can see, we still have a long way to go. The idea is that we’d be opening in the first quarter of 2025.”

The center will include pastures, demonstration areas, a food hub, a commercial kitchen, a covered outdoor arena, a large assembly room, offices for Cooperative Extensions, Soil and Water, 4H, and much more for open use by the public.

“In terms of budget, we’re at $29.3 million,” Hess said. “It’s still early, and prices are coming down, fortunately, so we’re hoping this will improve, and we’re working to improve it, but this is where we are today. In terms of where you are from a funding standpoint, you’re just $1 million short, and I don’t think you’ve even tapped into all your fundraising and grants and all of the opportunities yet. But you’re really, really close.”

The board of commissioners also approved the acceptance of an Eastern Triad Workforce Initiative Grant.

“ETWI funds are meant to address workforce needs,” said Randolph Community College Vice President of Instructional Services Suzanne Rohrbaugh. “Any gaps, any areas we can grow. Ultimately our goal is to provide a trained workforce to meet industry needs, and we feel like the budget before you does exactly that by reducing a lot of the administrative costs. This year, we have the opportunity to go through just Randolph County. We have allocated our resources accordingly, and $750,000 is what’s been allocated to the county.”

According to Rohrbaugh, the funds will be focused on three areas: To generate and develop CTE interests, to pay the program director, and to ensure that high school graduates are prepared to take the next steps in their lives and careers.

“This $750,000 has been a fixed amount since 2018, from Day 1,” said chairman Darrell Frye. “But before, it had been going through Guilford County, and they took 40% of this money for themselves to administer our program. So in the past, we’ve only been getting about $450,000 of this money. This year, we get the whole $750,000 because it’s coming directly to each one of the counties.”

The board then approved the purchase of two lots totaling about 30 acres of the I-74 Industrial Center site – which totals 160 acres – at $35,000 an acre to be eligible to receive funding from the Department of Commerce’s Utility Grant. Along with that, the board approved the acceptance of a $1 million grant and authorized an agreement with the NCDOT for the design and alignment of Wall Brothers Road.

“This is a 160-acre site that we’re looking to develop into an industrial park,” said Economic Development Corporation Business Recruitment Director Crystal Gettys. “The property is located at the interchange of I-74 and Highway 311 in Sophia. The Randolph County EDC has been working with the private developer, Randolph County, the city of Randleman, and the City of Asheboro in providing the infrastructure necessary to support the development in the future industrial park.”

The board held public hearings for the abolishment and reforming of Fire Tax Districts for the East Side, Level Cross, Randleman-Sophia, and Tabernacle Fire Districts in order to eliminate the $0.15 tax cap that the districts had. 

These four districts are a part of the greater reformatting of every fire district, with four other districts – Guil-rand, West Side, Climax, and Franklinville – having already been reformatted earlier this year.

The change is not a tax increase but instead a process to put all of the county’s fire districts under the same rules and provide a more streamlined method for the districts to potentially request a tax increase if needed.

After no public comments were brought forth, the board abolished and reformatted each district.

The board finally accepted a $2.5 million Wastewater and Sewer Grant and designated it to be applied to the Seagrove-Ulah Wastewater Treatment Plant Improvement Capital Project. In addition, they approved two budget amendments, one for an additional $1.5 million for the Emergency Services VIPER Tower and an additional $2 million for Public Health Facility Renovations.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet October 3.

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Local state of emergency officially terminated in Randolph County

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday where the local State of Emergency was officially terminated, and the board approved multiple financial items. 

One of the first items of action that the board took was for Chairman Darrell Frye to officially terminate the local State of Emergency in Randolph County that had been enacted in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic following the end of the statewide State of Emergency in North Carolina.

“Looking back, they always say hindsight is 20/20, but I think we did about as good as we could do through that process,” Frye said. “I think we weathered it and came through it as good or as better as any other county, and that is attributed to a lot of you folks that’s in this room right now, in your various positions working for all the citizens of Randolph County to keep us as safe as possible as we went through that process.”

The board of commissioners also approved three new deputy positions for and funded by the City of Trinity.

“The city of Trinity has approved three new positions, which would bring the total to five,” said Lt. Colonel Steve Myers. “The three new positions were originally discussed on 10-hour shifts, and the Sheriff has asked us to reapproach Trinity, which we did, and reconfigure some salary adjustments for those three deputies for 12-hour shifts, which would bring them in line with our current patrol division and the 12-hour shifts that they work.” 

The Farm Food and Family Event Center (F3EC) also received funding support, as the board approved two USDA loans through the Randolph Electric Membership Corporation (REMC) as well as an ARPA rural transformation grant.

“We have an opportunity to work with REMC,” said Assistant County Manager and Finance Officer Will Massie. “They have access to some USDA rural development loan money, and they have been supportive of our agricultural center project. We talked about two different loans. One is specifically for $2 million for the arena space and the second $2 million loan is for the event center space. This maximized the amount we could pull down from the USDA. These loans are for soft costs, not for construction. So we can use them to pay for professional fees, equipment, furniture, fencing, things like that but not for the building itself. 0% interest, but 1% administrative fee. Go up to 10 years. There has to be some sort of security from a USDA perspective, and what REMC suggested was an escrow account where we would put some of the county money with a bank trustee, and that would serve as collateral for the loan until it’s paid off. You can also do a deed of trust for the property.”

As security for the loan, the county can either set up an escrow account with county money with a bank trustee or a deed of trust for the property. 

“[The rural transformation grant] is another opportunity to help finance the F3EC project,” Massie said. “The state created a rural transformation grant program from the ARPA money, and one of the programs in that transformation grant was for resiliency. The resilient neighborhoods program and what that will do is provide some funding for the creation of healthy living initiatives, development of health and nutritional education programs, and elimination of food deserts. That is the purpose of the $900,000 grant that is being offered to the county.”

Since the grant is funded through state ARPA funds, the project moves from primarily a local county project to an ARPA project.

Finally, the board of commissioners approved a $20,750 change order for the replacement of non-metallic cable for the Juvenile Day Reporting Center Project. 

“This is the space that Child Support moved out of,” said County Engineer Paxton Arthurs. “We’re going in and building four new classrooms for JDRC. We’re renovating probably a third of the building, and the rest of it is going to be used as is.”

According to Arthurs, the building is non-combustible construction with an acoustical drop ceiling throughout, and so the building would typically have electrical in conduit or metal clad cable, however, the current state of the wiring is a lot of non-metallic cables coated in plastic sheathing in the electrical work of the building which isn’t up to code.

However, instead of requiring all the wiring to be replaced, the electrical inspector made a compromise to only change out the cables in the areas where they will be opening up the ceiling, according to Arthurs.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet September 6.

RandolphCoBoard

Next set of Fire District restructuring begins after Board of Commissioners approval

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday with the restructuring of a new set of Fire Districts as well as a presentation of an improvement plan for the Health Department. These were the top items on the agenda.

The process of restructuring the Fire Districts in Randolph County to remove the 15-cent tax rate cap that these districts had continued with four new districts was brought forth before the board for approval to start the process.

The process – which has already been completed for Guil-Rand, Climax, West Side, and Franklinville Fire Districts – began with the board’s approval to abolish the current capped Fire Districts for East Side, Level Cross, Randleman-Sophia, and Tabernacle and establish a public hearing for September 6 to be held so that the new districts can be formed.

The four fire departments will still cover the exact same areas, with the only change being that they will no longer be held to a 15-cent fire tax cap, albeit the departments still would have to get approval from the Board of Commissioners for any proposed tax hike.

“This is not a tax increase,” said Chairman Darrell Frye. “Any increase has to come before this elected board of county commissioners, and they have to approve a request. It puts every fire department here under the same guidelines and the same rules.”

The board also approved two contract addendums, with the first being with Smith-Sinnett to add $185,000 for the design, bidding, and construction administration of the Randolph County Health Department.

“The original Health Department was built in the early ‘80s, so it’s about 40 years old,” said Robert Carmac of Smith-Sinnett. “It’s had some minor renovations done over the years, but the majority of those renovations were a make-do situation. Most of the buildings and exam rooms remain as is. I remember when I was young, going into the health department as a kid and the same orange countertops that had been there for years. Given what we’ve gone through over the years, there is no secret the value that the health department provides to the community. But they are very much in a make-do situation.”

Smith-Sinnett was originally commissioned to conduct a space needs study for the health department and brought forth a preliminary plan of action for a redesign.

“They are trying to make-do, but I think through this study and what we’ve shown is a plan to provide better customer service, better flow for the patients that are coming, and a better usage of the space,” Carmac said.

According to Carmac, they will ask for a $1.5 million base bid for construction, with a 6-8 month design window and an 8-12 month construction window which would see the completion of the project by late 2023 to early 2024.

The second approved addendum was with the contract with Hobbs Architects for the Historic Courthouse Museum design to add $44,950 to the project to design the replacement of the upstairs HVAC.

The board of commissioners approved a request from Bordeaux Construction for additional funding and a time extension for the Randolph County Detention Center expansion project.

The approved funding request will be provided as a change order to the contract for a total of $322,796 in two different contingencies.

“In addition to the money, we are also requesting for a time extension of four months,” said John Witcher from Bordeaux Construction. “This is a two-month time extension for the Phase 2 issues that we encountered with the smoke control system required by the state and then also a two-month time extension that would be added on to the end of the project so that we can deliver the maintenance building for the project.” 

According to Chairman Frye, the additional funding will not need to be taken from the budget and is instead already interspersed in the project.

“We do have some funds in other areas of this project that don’t require any budget amendments or the setting aside of any additional funding at this time,” Frye said. “We still have about a year to go in this process, and some other issues could turn up, but right now, this does not require us to budget additional funds to complete the project as we know it today.”

The board also then approved a resolution with Lancaster Customworks, Inc. to enter into an economic development incentive agreement for the construction of a new facility. 

“Lancaster is a high-end upholstery manufacturing company located currently in 18,000 square feet in the city of Archdale,” said EDC President Kevin Franklin. “The company has been around for 30 years, and they are continuing to enjoy consistent growth and double-digit sales over the last several years and have just outgrown the facility they are in now. There is no room around the current building for any further expansion, and so they are looking at a new location to build a brand new facility in the city of Archdale, and it’s just a stone’s throw from their current location.”

According to Franklin, the incentive package would have a total cash amount of $120,700 over five years. Of that, $79,000 will come from Randolph County, and up to $41,700 will come from the city of Archdale.

“The full investment of the project is anticipated to exceed $5,000,000, which will include $4,295,000 in real property and about $731,000 in machinery and equipment for that facility,” Franklin said. “They will retain their current full-time workforce of about 25 employees and plan to create 27 new jobs overall in a five-year period related to this expansion. The average annual wage of the new jobs will be at least $46,000, about $6,000 on average more than the current annual average wage here in Randolph County.”  

The Annual Settlement Report was presented to the board for the 2021-22 tax year, and it was reported that Randolph County had a 99.24% collection rate for real estate, business, and individual personal property.

The board also appointed Debra Hill to a new, four-year term as County Tax Collector and approved a request from the Board of Elections to reclassify their part-time office assistant 3 position to a full-time election programs specialist. 

The board then approved the request to purchase four 2022 Type I Ford F-450 4×4 TraumaHawk ambulances for $1,146,164 from Northwestern Emergency Vehicles, Inc. through the Houston-Galveston Area Council’s competitive bidding program.

Finally, the board approved the submission of two applications for USDA Rural Development loans, each for $2 million to be paid out over ten years with zero percent interest for the Farm Food and Family Education Center.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet August 1.

RandolphCoBoard

Four Fire Districts officially restructured to remove fire tax cap

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ASHEBORO — The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday, June 6 where they officially approved the abolishment and subsequent restructuring of four of the county’s fire districts.

The County closed the final public hearings for the fire tax district restructuring for Climax, Franklinville, Guil-Rand and Westside fire departments and passed the resolution to officially change all four of them. 

The four fire departments will still cover the same areas, the only change is that they will no longer be held to a 15 cent fire tax cap, albeit the departments still would have to get approval by the Board of Commissioners for any proposed tax hike.

The board will open up public hearings to restructure another four fire districts in the coming months.

The board of commissioners then heard three budgeting requests, but did not take any action. The requests came from the Sandhills Center, the Children’s Home Society TogetherWorks Program and the Ramseur Public Library.

The Sandhills Center is an organization that operates in 11 counties, including Randolph, to offer treatment and support for mental health, intellectual/developmental disabilities and substance use disorders.

“The request I am submitting tonight is the same amount it has been for several years here in Randolph County and that is $844,000,” said Sandhills Center CEO, Victoria Whitt. “That funding stays right here in Randolph County to support behavioral health needs that do not have insurance, Medicare or Medicaid. I hope that as you’re doing your budget process, that you will see fit to continue funding the Sandhills Center.” 

The Sandhills Center has been operating in Randolph County for a few years and the partnership has worked well for both the county and its citizens.

“For history, we used to be our own mental health agency, and we kind of went kicking and screaming a little bit, but we could not have picked a better partner,” said Chairman Darrell Frye.

The next request the board heard was for the Children’s Home Society TogetherWorks program.

TogetherWorks is a program that aims to utilize community collected data to create solutions to problems, focusing on family stress in Randolph County.

“When we looked at family wellness data, the overwhelming conclusion was that the outcomes are moving in the wrong directions for families,” said Donna Woods, strategy director for TogetherWorks. “At every stage of data that was received from DSS, we found more and more family stress.”

Woods outlined that the increased family stress has led to an overwhelm of the current DSS systems, preventing them from providing proper care. She stated that the current system is simply not working and stated that it was time for a new, community-driven change. 

“With TogetherWorks, we believe it’s time to put the solutions back into the hands of the local community,” Woods said. “This really takes place via a four-step process that is action oriented and is driven by launching a citizen engagement team.”

The steps would be to create a local team composed of families who have felt these stressors first hand along with key stakeholders. Together, this team would diagnosis the problems, then develop distinct solutions, and finally implement those solutions over a two-year period, during which time, they’d partner with a top-tier research institution to best utilize and interpret the data.

The goal for the program is that by 2025, there will be a clear understanding of what is working and they will have the knowledge of how to  expand the successful strategies across the county as a whole.

“The project is asking for $200,000 per year for three years, that would then be matched by private dollars,” said Matt Anderson, Director of the Institute for Family at Children’s Home Society of North Carolina. “Children’s Home Society has already raised and committed $750,000 to this project. That would leave a gap of about $430,000 on the total project budget of $1.7 million, which is already in the process of being raised.”

Finally, the Town of Ramseur requested that Randolph County take over operations of the Ramseur Public Library. 

“The library system now is composed of four libraries operated by the county with significant municipal support – Asheboro, Archdale, Franklinville and Seagrove – and three libraries operated by their municipalities with significant county support – Liberty, Ramseur and Randleman,” said Public Library Director, Ross Holt. “We’re a bit unusual in this respect as most library systems in North Carolina, the library is one unit with all services and facilities operated and funded by the county government.”

According to Holt, the Town of Ramseur decided that what would be best for the Ramseur Public Library would be for it to be operated by the county as the town had run into financial trouble and needed to get its expenses better in line with its revenues. 

The board of commissioners next approved two budget amendments for infrastructure projects in the county.

The first approval was for the expansion of the Wastewater Treatment Plant in Seagrove by LKC Engineering for a cost of $343,500. According to County Engineer, Paxton Arthurs, the firm expects to have the project constructed within two years.

The board then approved an addendum to the contract with Wooten for the I-74 Industrial Site Sewer Design to increase the flow capacity from 150,000 gallons a day to 350,000 gallons a day.

The 350,000 gallon a day marker would cover the outtake for the whole of the Randleman sewer basin, according to Arthurs.

The cost is $82,500, to increase the size of the gravity sewer and force main from 8-inches to 12-inches and extend the line by 8,800 feet to another intake for the City of Asheboro to have the ability to provide this capacity. 

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet July 11. 

RBC

County board chairman says the restructuring of fire districts is not a tax increase

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ASHEBORO – The Randolph County Board of Commissioners met Monday with multiple budget items on the agenda as well as to provide some clarification in regards to the new fire districts.

First up, the board of commissioners approved the final design by HH Architecture for the development of the Farm, Food and Family Education Center as well as a budget amendment to reallocate the funds that the county had already set aside for the project. 

The plan, which will cost $29,564,000, will have around 44 acres of development with around 60 acres of undeveloped land as a buffer.

“There’s a couple of parts, but Cooperative Extension will have offices, there’ll be gardens, labs, and a demonstration kitchen,” said HH Architecture CEO, Kristen Hess. “Soil and Water will have their offices with meeting and classroom space. There’s a proposed maker space and then a commercial kitchen for businesses actually wanting to start with a kitchen certified by the county. There’s a big exhibit hall component with concessions and an open-air arena for livestock shows and sales. We have a lot of accessory buildings as well just to be in support. Incubator barns, equipment sheds, greenhouses, raw material storage, animal staging. These are all necessary for the support of the facility.”

The board also held its first round of public hearings for the restructuring of the county’s fire tax districts to remove the 15 cent fire tax cap, starting with the Climax, Franklinville, Guil-Rand and Westside. 

“This is not a tax increase,” said Chairman Darrell Frye on the restructuring. “This is not a budget increase hearing tonight. Fire departments have no taxing authority. This board was elected by the citizens of this county to represent them. Any changes in the fire tax can only be made by the board of county commissioners.”

“We have rates over a wide range, but our caps are at 15 cents. Any fire department in the county can go over that limit right now. The problem is that when the citizens would get their tax bills, it would have the 15 cent fire tax and if their fire tax was set at 15 or 16, there would be a second line for that additional tax and that could be confusing. That they had two fire taxes on their tax bill when really there’s only one, but it had to be done that way under the current structure. That’s one of the reasons why we wanted to change the structures of the fire districts.”

In more of an effort to be transparent, according to associate county attorney Aimee Scotton, the county had sent out notices alerting the public about these proposed changes.

However, there was some confusion among the public in regards to a statement in that notice about the county’s tax cap of $1.50. Some felt that this was going to be the newly proposed fire tax rate, leading to a bit of uproar. 

“That $1.50 [tax rate] is set by the State of North Carolina,” Frye said. “It also includes your Randolph County property taxes. It’s not just a limit on fire taxes. It is a cap on any county wide tax that would be passed in this county. For example, if you had a school tax, that would be added into this total. And the total for all of these taxes cannot exceed $1.50. So there is a cap but it’s all inclusive to protect you against a higher level of any sort of taxes.”

Randolph County is not looking to raise the fire tax rate during these public hearings, however, Chairman Frye did note that some fire departments, such as Climax, are asking to increase those rates, but that would require them to present a proposed budget before the board of commissioners for approval.

The board approved second-year bids for Aging Services to Randolph Senior Adults Association (RSSA), who will be the lead agency in Randolph County, and Regional Consolidated Services (RCS).

The agencies help provide adult daycare, congregant nutrition, home-delivered meals, information and options counseling, transportation, in-home aid at levels I, II and III and housing and home improvement to older residents who need additional assistance.

Along with approving the agency bids, the board also approved their proposed fiscal year 21-22 fund allocation.

“Working with the current Randolph County award amount, the Aging Services Planning Committee recommends to you for board approval the following amounts: Randolph Senior Adults, $586,904 and Regional Consolidated Services, $310,349, for a total Randolph County allocation of $897,253 as it is known today,” said Executive Director of RSSA, Mark Hensley.

Funding will not need to come from Randolph County and is instead provided by Community Services Block Grants and the Older Americans Act. The county’s only role is deciding who the provider will be and how their funds will be allocated over their three year bid.

The board of commissioners also renewed its contract with Mediko, Inc. for inmate medical services at a cost of $791,532.55. 

According to Sheriff’s Office Manager, Justin Brubaker, Correctional Healthcare was another competitive option that was looked into, but Mediko proved to be the preferred option with things such as their use of LPNs and the familiarity already had with them. 

“We’ve been with Mediko since November of 2019,” Brubaker said. “As far as COVID-19 and what we’ve been through, we can’t say enough about the staff with Mediko. It’s just that bond, that relationship we have with Mediko. We’ve trusted them since 2019.”

County manager, Hal Johnson, gave an update on the opioid settlement that Randolph County had participated in, stating that the county would see $9,824,000 over an 18 year period, with the first payment of $377,000 expected in late spring. The money has safeguards on it that will only allow it to be used on things that will “help offset the effects of the opioid epidemic.”

“The memorandum of agreement that we signed with the State, outlines about seven or eight different areas that the county will focus on as we begin to develop programs and allocate money to various treatment options,” Johnson said. “The county government must also sponsor a joint planning meeting with all of our municipalities. That meeting will be open to the public also and it’s a time for the county to meet formally with our municipalities and agencies and talk about different options that we may want to pursue over time.”

The board then awarded a contract to S&S Building and Development for the Social Services renovations at Northgate. 

The low bid offer came in at $1,318,792, but the extra costs of the project are going to see a projected total of $1,599,792, which the board has already budgeted for. The project is expected to be completed in 10 months.

Finally, the board gave approval for a fourth – and potentially final – budget amendment for the Courthouse Renovation Capital Project 

“We’ve gotten our substantial completion, they’ve moved in, they’re occupying the space, there’s just a few little odds and ends to be wrapped up,” said county engineer, Paxton Arthurs. “The main thing being the changes to the front counter with the secure transaction and the deal trays.”

The amendment, which is for $26,000, will finish out and close the project according to Arthurs.

The Randolph County Board of Commissioners will next meet June 6.

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