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At the Tuesday, June 13, Cumberland County Board of Supervisors meeting local agencies gave an update on recent successes and future plans for the coming months. 

Cumberland Schools celebrate a successful end of year.

Superintendent Dr. Chip Jones was back with an update on the conclusion of the 2022-2023 school year and plans for the summer. 

The Annual Area Youth Art Exhibit at Longwood Center for visual arts is running through Sunday, Aug. 6 and features 27 Cumberland County Public School artists. The advertisement also featured the art from a recently graduated senior. 

For facility updates, the work on the track has begun and is expected to be finished by the middle of July. The roof on the former library has been completed and the electronic sign on Route 60 has been installed.

“So now we can be a bit more into the modern times,” said Jones. “You don’t have to have a ladder to change that in the rain, sleet, snow, whatever it may take.”

For sports, along with the Lady Duke track team who had an amazing season, the Cumberland High School softball team also did well. They made it to the second round of the regional 1B tournament. According to Jones, it has been around 12 years since Cumberland softball has made it to a post-season play. 

The class of 2023 held many academic accomplishments including 41 honors graduates, 41 academic jacket recipients, 44 had grade point averages over 3.5 and 28 of those earned associates degrees, four students earned certified nursing assistants, seven ServSafe manager certifications, two Microsoft Office Specialist certifications, four ITF+ certifications, three A+ certifications and three welding certifications.

The Library keeps moving forward 

The Cumberland County Library’s summer reading program is underway. Children grades kindergarten through second grade come on Tuesdays and grades third through fourth come to the library on Wednesdays. They receive a free book and record what they read through the Beanstack reading program.

They moved all accounting, payroll and direct deposit software from a laptop to a desktop. Doing this also updated all firmware and software so now security and performance are now improved. The server they had was six years old and it was estimated if the server went down the library could be down for weeks with no backup. They replaced the server with a new one that is more reliable and the old server is now a backup in case something happens. 

“We’ve also hired several assistants to help with our summer scheduling and cover gaps in the schedule,” said Glenn Mozingo, chair of the board of trustees. 

The board of trustees is looking at options to keep supporting the community. They realize they have a responsibility to the community and are looking at all their options to ensure the library keeps operating in a way to meet the needs of the community and preserves the financial stability of the library. 

Fire and EMS continue to improve system

Chief Andy Aigner gave an update on what Cumberland Fire and EMS have worked on these past few months. Aigner, with the help of the volunteer chiefs and others in the community, is continuing to work on the standard operating procedures. Sections one and two are finished and section three is still coming together as it defines how they operate on a fire or EMS scene. 

“It should reduce radio traffic,” said Aigner. “It should reduce the standing around, everyone will have an assignment so they’ll know what they are supposed to do.”

Section four is the fire marshall section and is almost complete and ready to send off to the sheriff to make sure the policies align. Section five is the EMS section and is also complete and the medical director currently has them to approve. 

Work on the computer aided dispatch (CAD) is also coming together. Previously it was a mess when used to find who was available to dispatch. Aigner has worked with multiple departments to make sure everyone is on the same page. 

“The biggest bulk of what we needed to get done is done,” said Aigner. “We are very happy… Our volunteer chiefs played a huge role in what we send on calls, who first due and helped me build those first few maps.”

The department has reinstated the volunteer program and has already gotten 11 volunteers. A process has been created to streamline getting the volunteers in and where they need to be.