Cumberland County Officials are working to recover after a fire last week caused significant damage to the Cumberland County Election Commission office.
The cause of the fire has not yet been determined. Cumberland County Mayor Allen Foster said the election commission is currently setting up a temporary office located at the former Lansford Kawasaki building on Main Street.
“My staff and my team knows that this is a number one priority,” Foster said. “We got to get this set up and ready to go for the people. Voting is one of our most fundamental rights, and we got to make sure that it occurs on time and in a safe and good way.”
Foster said the temporary office has not been fully set up yet. However, Foster said early voting will be held at the temporary location, and early voting for the May 5 primary will remain from April 15th through April 30th, Monday–Friday 8 pm–5pm and Saturday 8am–12pm.
“Elections will be held on time, but I will tell you it’s not without a herculean effort by Jill Davis, our elections administrator, and her team over there,” Foster said. “Our finance department’s been involved, building maintenance, Ben Lomand, our network company, computer techs, attorney, you name it, they’ve been involved in getting this going.”
Foster said the county is also working to replace election equipment lost in the fire.
“There were definitely critical systems that were damaged,” Foster said. “The main building that the public would see was just mostly smoke damage, but the area where the voting machines were stored and some of the office space is destroyed.”
Foster said the county is now awaiting further guidance from insurance adjusters to determine whether the damaged facility will be repaired or replaced. Officials also plan to notify the public once the temporary office is fully operational and are encouraging residents to help spread the word about the new location.
Foster said he praises the local first responders for their efforts in responding to the fire.
“The city fire, police, county fire, sheriff’s department, all the first responders were great during this, or it could have been even worse,” Foster said.
Foster said updates on the temporary office location and contact information will be shared with the public as soon as they become available.
