On January 19, 2020, Orange County Emergency Services activated its Emergency Operations Center to prepare for a virus called COVID-19.

530 days and a global pandemic later, the county government decided to ends its operations center’s response.

The Orange County Emergency Operations Center, or EOC, formally ended its activities to coordinate response to COVID-19 on June 30. When activated, the center gathers staff from several county departments, as well as city, state and federal agencies, and crafts plans to rapidly respond to threats to community safety.

Chair of the Orange County Commissioners Renee Price told 97.9 The Hill she found June 30 to be a “happy day” for county staff involved with the EOC, who each received certificates for their efforts during the pandemic.

“We had the final briefing and little celebration: boxed lunches at the Eno River Farmers Market pavilion,” said Price. “We gave tribute to all these men and women, volunteers and staff, everyone involved with keeping Orange County resident safe to the best extent possible.”

The EOC closes as Orange County has experienced 8,626 COVID-19 cases and 101 deaths among its residents, according to the state Department of Health and Human Services. Additionally, the county currently leads North Carolina in its vaccination rate against the coronavirus, with 63 percent of its population fully vaccinated.

Price said with those data points, emergency officials with Orange County determined it was time to close the Emergency Operations Center.

“The meetings [for the EOC] started early on in the pandemic [and] there were regular meetings quite close together,” she said. “As time went on, particularly when I became chair, we started meeting once a month, then once every two months.”

“There’s still work to be done to get people vaccinated,” Price added, “but the actual Emergency Operations Center honing in every week, every two weeks, no longer needed to do that because they had done such a phenomenal job and got the rest of the residents of Orange County to follow suit.”

Price said with so many people working together to aid the county, the Emergency Operations Center built a “community spirit” as they combatted COVID-19. She said, though, that it is time for the next chapter in the local response and recovery.

“People made friends, we kept each other healthy and safe, and we even had to console various one who lost a relative either here or somewhere else because of COVID-19,” said Price. “It was amazing how people came together and we were able to get through this pandemic. And now we’ve got to get through this transformation and recovery. People will go back to their assigned jobs, and maybe they will be tweaked a little bit, so now we’ve got to figure out how to switch back and move forward with a new normal.”

The state of emergency for Orange County put in place to inform residents about COVID-19 and enable additional resources for the county government’s response is set to expire on July 30.

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