Nash Community College seeks county support as it plans $22 million health sciences building and requests operating increases

Dr. Honeyut, president of Nash Community College, told Nash County commissioners on May 12 that the college is expanding its workforce-training capacity and needs updated facilities to keep pace with demand. He described the college's reach—serving students from dozens of counties and several states—and cited what he called a roughly $86 million annual economic impact on the county and a claimed 30:1 return on county funding.

The college's next major capital priority is a proposed health sciences building estimated at about $22 million, Dr. Honeyut said, which he said would modernize instruction for nursing, allied health and related programs and free up space on the main campus for City High. "It allows us to place our medical fields, nursing, medicine, physical therapy, CNA into state-of-the-art facilities," he said.

Carol Dorce, the college's chief financial officer, reviewed recent completed projects (an amphitheater phase; a new chiller; boiler replacement), in-progress maintenance work (an elevator upgrade, three parking-lot resurfacing projects and a driver-training pavilion supported by a $1 million OSBM allocation) and the FY26-27 request. She said slides presented to commissioners showed operating and plant requests that amount to a roughly 5.95% increase over the prior year and slide totals near $4.09 million. The college is requesting a 3% salary increase for full-time staff and a targeted raise for part-time workers to reach $15 per hour; it also asked the county to consider covering 50% of a new executive director of facilities, safety and risk position, with the state covering the other half.

Dr. Honeyut emphasized that many recent projects were completed without new debt and credited county land transfers and grants for enabling projects such as a driver-training center and a veterinary-technology annex. "We could not do that without the partnership of Nash County," he said.

Commissioners asked about future enrollment growth; the college said recent year-over-year growth had risen from about 2.2% to more than 6% this year, but officials cautioned facilities constraints could limit continued rapid expansion.

The college's team invited commissioners to a May 26 ribbon-cutting for an EMS mobile training unit purchased with grant funds.

What's next: The presentation provided the commissioners with the college's capital priorities and operating requests; county staff will consider those figures as they develop the county budget.

Sources: Presentation by Dr. Honeyut and CFO Carol Dorce to the Nash County Board of Commissioners (May 12, 2026).