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Buncombe County wins multiple NACo awards; volunteers recognized for Helene family assistance center
Summary
Commissioners celebrated Buncombe County winning multiple National Association of Counties achievement awards and recognized volunteers and county staff for work at the Helene Family Assistance Center; officials also highlighted local reading mentors and opioid-recovery outreach programs honored by NACo.
At its Sept. 2 meeting, the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners recognized staff and volunteers after the county earned multiple awards from the National Association of Counties (NACo).
Strategy and Innovation staff highlighted four NACo achievement awards. County programs singled out included Camp Rio, a free, weeklong environmental and agricultural summer camp for children of migrant farmworkers and children in foster care run by the Agricultural and Land Resources program; Buncombe Connections: Hope, Healing, Community Health Education, a multilingual opioid recovery outreach program produced by the Office of Equity and Human Rights and Health and Human Services; a Reading Mentors program at Inka Candler Public Library that recruits male volunteers for story time; and the Family Assistance Center created during Hurricane Helene to help find missing people and provide emergency assistance.
Staff and volunteers described the Family Assistance Center’s work during Helene: assembling volunteer teams, creating a registry to locate loved ones, coordinating with search-and-rescue and other partners, and operating intake and referral functions across county facilities. County officials singled out volunteers for a standing ovation and thanked staff across departments for their disaster response.
Library staff noted the reading mentors program was also recognized by the North Carolina Public Library Directors Association as the large system program of the year, and county behavioral-health staff publicized a local recovery rally scheduled for Sept. 19.
Why this matters: The awards highlight county programs that provide direct services—youth environmental education, addiction recovery outreach, disaster response and literacy initiatives—and recognize collaborative work among county departments and community partners.
