On Dec. 16, Polk County Cooperative Extension will be waking up to a new day in a new location. After nearly 50 years at the current location on the courthouse square, Extension will be moving to a newer and more functional facility located at 79 Carmel Lane, Columbus.

This facility is 1.1 miles or four minutes from our current location. From Mills Street, take Houston Road to Skyuka and turn left onto Carmel Lane. The new N.C. State Extension Center will be located directly behind The Meeting Place (senior center).

We are very excited about our new home and are very thankful to our county officials for making this space available to us! This new facility is handicap accessible and provides more room for our classes. In recent times we have had to turn people away from classes due to lack of space. This new facility will eliminate that problem and allow us to accommodate anyone that wants to attend classes such as lawn care, vegetable production, food preservation, pesticide updates, and 4H classes to name a few. We hope to be able to provide many more class offerings and reach many more of our Polk County citizens as a result of this fantastic new space.

In addition to classes, the Polk County Center of N.C. State Extension will be developing a small vegetable research farm at this location. Polk County has a very unique climate and a growing farming community. We hope to be a one stop shop for those looking for the best vegetable varieties to grow to maximize yield and pest resistance in our local climate.

We’ve always been your expert source for unbiased, research-based information, but now we hope to show you as well as tell you. Please come and visit us at our new location and we hope you will become a regular user of Extension services. 

– article submitted by Sarah Gottfried