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McDowell County introduces new public health director, outlines school outreach and emergency planning
Summary
Jason Masters was introduced as McDowell County public health director and described priorities including stronger coordination with emergency management, school-based public‑health education by grade level, mobile-unit outreach and an incident command structure for responses.
The McDowell County Board formally heard from Jason Masters after his appointment as public health director.
Masters told the board he has an environmental‑health background and has been with local health operations for many years. He said he became public health director effective July 1 after serving as interim director and described current priorities: "establishing and strengthening relationships with other county agencies, most notably emergency management and McDowell County Schools," standing up an incident command structure for large responses, and deploying a mobile unit for community outreach.
Masters outlined a plan to tailor presentations to school levels: basic hygiene, nutrition and exercise for elementary students; mental‑health and puberty hygiene topics for middle school; and signs of anxiety, depression and food‑safety topics for high school students. He said the health department is also coordinating a public‑information effort with a county public information officer to provide more unified messaging.
Board members thanked Masters for the update and for moving to fill gaps identified during the COVID response. Masters said the health department remains about three weeks behind on environmental health backlogs but emphasized ongoing work to improve communications and resource sharing with other county units.
The board did not take a formal vote on these items; the presentation served to orient commissioners to the health department's near‑term plans.
