ROCKINGHAM — The Rockingham City Council heard an update on the work being done downtown to improve the former Food King property and Mayor Steve Morris issued a proclamation naming November “Hospice and Palliative Care Month.”
Though the Food King property remains vacant, the city will work over the next month to add curbs and islands in the parking lot which will contain shrubbery and new light fixtures. This will “improve aesthetics” for the now-public parking lot, Assistant City Manager John Massey said in an email Monday.
Repairs to a rotting retaining wall will likely be completed early in the new year, according to Massey. The city has repaired the roof of the Food King building and removed asbestos in recent months, and repairs to the floor will soon begin.
City Manager Monty Crump that the $25,000 for this project, which included a wheelchair ramp between Studio 3 and Creative Hair Designs, was budgeted last year but construction was delayed due to the improvements to the Harrington Square fountain.
Massey said money to repave the whole parking lot at the corner of East Washington Street and North Randolph Street will be included in next fiscal year’s budget.
Arturo DeAguilar, director of human resources for Richmond County Hospice, was on hand to thank Morris for recognizing Hospice and Palliative Care Month. The resolution noted that hospice provides “comfort and dignity” to those who are in their final months of life.
“In an increasingly fragmented and broken health care system, hospice is one of the few sectors that demonstrates how health care can — and should — work at its best for its patient,” the resolution reads. “Every year 1.5 million Americans living with life-limiting illness, and their families, received care from the nation’s hospice programs in communities throughout the United States.”
DeAguilar said Richmond County Hospice has been known as “one of the greatest secrets” in the county, but they don’t want it to be a secret anymore.
“We want everybody to know what Hospice is about because a lot of people hear the word ‘hospice’ and they freak out. They think ‘they’re coming for me,’ and it’s not that,” he said. “We’re trying to educate, to serve and the more people know about (hospice) they more we can do our job.”
DeAguilar added that this “secret” should be a “treasure.”
Last month, the City of Rockingham completed its annual contribution of $50,000 to Discovery Place Kids. Catherine Wilson Horne, president and CEO of Discovery Place, wrote a letter to the city thanking them for the funds, saying that they would help them provide “hands-on, minds-in STEM education to children in the Sandhills region.”