LAURINBURG — The Scotland County Board of Commissioners met Tuesday night and declared a state of emergency for Scotland County, and the city of Laurinburg followed suit the next day.
Countgy Chairman Bob Davis signed the declaration at the start of the meeting, which stated that the National Weather Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration along with other sources indicate that Hurricane Dorian is approaching North Carolina and will likely impact the county.
“Right now we’re preparing and waiting and seeing how the storm is moving,” said Scotland County Emergency Services Director Roylin Hammond. “It’s projected to begin affecting us around Thursday afternoon into the evening with some possible rain showers in the morning … because of that, the EOC will not be staffed tonight but we will begin staffing it 24 hours a day (Thursday).”
Hammond said the area is currently only projected to get 4 to 6 inches of rain, which may cause water to stand in the roadways, but it will not cause flooding. He did encourage residents to be prepared for power outages as the area will be getting winds of 40 to 60 miles per hour, which has potential to bring tree limbs and trees down onto powerlines.
“Right now we’re feeling comfortable since it doesn’t seem like it will affect us much,” Hammond said. “We do have extra resources coming in and the National Guard is coming in just in case since we do have a very limited amount of manpower in Scotland County when it comes to emergency services. But I think right now we’re in good shape and we’ll continue watching the storm.”
Hammond added that the county offices, except for emergency personnel, would be closed on Thursday.
The city of Laurinburg had not announced that they would be closed Thursday as of press time. but the city did follow the same suit as the county by issuing a state of emergency at 12:30 p.m. Wednesday.
“We’ve seen three years of storms so we have replacement pieces on hand in case anything needs to be repaired, generators for the water and sewer plants,” City Manager Charles Nichols said. “We’re prepping for the worst, but hoping for the best.”
There were also no curfews set in place at the time of print, but officials encouraged residents to keep an eye out on the Facebook pages of the local governments to remain updated as they continue to meet twice a day at 11:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m.
“We’re encouraging people to be prepared and stay off the roads if we do end up getting the heavy winds and rain,” Nichols said. “Hopefully it won’t hit us like the storms have the past few years but we’re still doing everything in our power to be prepared.”
A majority of the schools in the area have also announced closures in preparations for the storm. St. Andrews University announced Tuesday that classes would be canceled on Thursday and Friday for students, while staff has to report their regular office hours during the two days, along with all campus administrative offices being open on a normal schedule.
The university has allowed the students who wished to remain on campus, but with all of the campus being dry and a general curfew being enforced.
Scotland County Schools followed suit by canceling classes throughout the district for Thursday and Friday for both students and staff, with hopes to open back Monday.
Reach Katelin Gandee at 910-506-3171 or at kgandee@laurinburgexch.wpenginepowered.com
