While some counties are doing all right with recent state closures aimed to fight COVID-19, these closures have pretty much shut down Northumberland County.
The school year is canceled, the courts are closed and public offices are closed to the public. Churches have canceled services and activities and public events have been called off.
Corinne Becker, executive director of the Rice’s Hotel/Hughlett’s Tavern in Heathsville said last week that the closure has disrupted their budget.
“We’re going to lose two, maybe three farmers’ markets,” Becker said. The April farmers’ market would have included the annual wine tasting which is a good source of revenue, she noted. Further, one of the hotel/tavern’s annual babecues has been canceled, a big loss.
Becker pointed out that the Stay at Home order is hurting many non-profit organizations which, like the hotel/tavern, rely on volunteers. Maybe worse, people who are used to activities such as the hotel/tavern’s guilds are losing a great part of their social lives.
The Red Cross’ Heathsville blood drive was almost canceled because St. Stephens Church where it is held, has been closed due to the pandemic. Ultimately, the church and the Red Cross worked it out so the blood drive could go forward.
Ellen Kirby, the church’s treasurer, said the Red Cross agreed not to have the Lions Club come in to provide food for the donors and to make the drive by appointment only. The Red Cross agreed to keep its spacing between donors safe and to taking other precautions. Surprisingly, drives similarly arranged in Warsaw were very successful, Kirby observed.
The church will be hurt by the closure, Bill Kirby said, because it has had to cancel its annual Strawberry Festival, a major fund raising event.
Theresa Lambert, of the county’s economic planning commission said the loss of the Strawberry Festival was doubly unfortunate since St. Stephens donates the festival proceeds to local charities.
One piece of good news for the church is that it and other non-profits can get grants under the recently passed federal relief acts designed to ease the pain of the virus-caused economic difficulties.
Lambert said the economic development commission and Chamber of Commerce are working on a joint plan to encourage people to get take-out meals from local restaurants to help keep them afloat until they can re-open. “When this is over, we want to have some restaurants,” she said.
One food purveyor, Fred Paul who operate Fred’s Barbecue is still open. His trailered, walk up, take out barbecue place is open in Callao Thursdays through Saturdays.
Newell’s Auto Repair has been hit by local conditions. Its owner, Joe Elliott, who is usually busy, said Saturday that he hasn’t had a repair job in three weeks.
Lambert said some businesses have had a mini-boom. Lilian Lumber, Ace Hardware and Callao Supply have been busy she said. They are classified as “essential” and people have been buying things for projects they can do at home.
Mason Brent of Heathsville said the distillery and grain businesses he is involved in are doing fine. The distillery is producing alcohol for sanitizers and he has sold a tremendous amount of corn to another distillery for use in producing alcohol for sanitizers.
Jim Michel, who owns a number of rental houses, said some of his tenants are out of work and can’t pay their rent. Michel said he wasn’t going to evict anybody and was working with his renters.
Michel, who is an active member of the Callao Moose, said the club is taking advantage of being closed by installing a new walk-in cooler freezer and a new generator. If the club were operating as usual, that could be disruptive, he said.
Waterman Michael Grimstead said he and others in his business are hurting because the restaurants are closed. The watermen can catch plenty of crabs and oysters but there are no buyers for them.
Omega Protein’s Ben Landry said Omega hasn’t been impacted by the shutdown and plans to launch its fleet on schedule in May. Omega has taken actions to protect its employees at its Reedville plant and on the steamers once they sail.
The Reverend Tyron Williams said his Mt. Olive Baptist Church is, like other churches closed, but the church is “supplying worship during shelter at home” via the internet, and conference calls. Williams sends emails to all his congregation urging it “not to let fear overwhelm them.”
With political primaries set for early June, the comunity electoral board is still looking for guidance from the state board of elections, local board member Joe Schlatter said. There may be a flood of requests for absentee ballots, he noted, in which case about 10,000 envelopes will be needed.
The county school board has been hindered in its efforts to replace deceased member Mary Hooper, Superintendent of Schools Holly Wargo said Friday. The process involves a public hearing which is not possible under current conditions. But “We still have time,” Wargo said.
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