DOBBINS HEIGHTS — Mayor Antonio Blue and Mayor Pro Tem Tyre Holloway urged residents to call Governor Roy Cooper and request that he call the general assembly in for a one-day session to consider expanding Medicaid due to the spread of coronavirus.
Blue said Thursday that he had just been on a conference call with Cooper to receive information about the state’s response to the pandemic. He said his “main takeaway” was that local governments are able to declare their own State of Emergency if needed.
“If this virus gets worse like it seems that it’s going to get, call the governor and ask him to call the general assembly back for a one-day session to discuss Medicaid expansion because a lot of people don’t have healthcare and if you’re under a certain age you have no healthcare,” Blue said. “If this thing becomes serious … then we’re going to have some folks that are sick that aren’t going to have the means to take care of themselves.”
Holloway echoed Blue’s call for Medicaid expansion. Until then, Holloway urged residents to be “cautious with everything that we do.”
“We’ve got to change the way we live our lives,” said Holloway.
Councilwoman Angeline David said the town would hold off on opening the pool at the Dobbins Heights Community Park “until we know what’s going on with the coronavirus.”
“I’m not even sure we’re going to open it,” David said.
In other business, the council approved a motion to allow the Richmond County Partnership for Children to hold a parent support group at the Dobbins Heights Community Center one day per month.
R.B. Gardner, community outreach coordinator with Habitat for Humanity of the NC Sandhills, updated the council on Habitat’s ongoing neighborhood revitalization project in Dobbins Heights, which is sponsored in part by Enviva. Since June 2019, Habitat and other volunteers have repaired homes or built handicap ramps for 13 families and completed five community cleanups on selected streets, according to Gardner.
Gardner said he has turned over the information on this partnership to Enviva to allow them to help them plan for sponsorship of the project in the coming year.
“Habitat is very grateful to be allowed the opportunity to partner with the Town of Dobbins Heights in their ongoing and future neighborhood revitalization programs,” Gardner said.


