Wingate police investigating break-ins on campus

Charity Smith and Bryant Lilley
Staff writers

Police chief Barry Glass reported to the Wingate Town Commissioners on Tuesday concerning multiple break-ins that have taken place on and around Wingate’s campus.
He said, “Although we have received several leads, we don’t have any definite suspects yet."
At the meeting, commissioners also approved the addition of another police officer for the department and voted to purchase another police car.
Another issue discussed at the meeting was the impending purchase of a new backhoe for the city. The purchase of this backhoe will help control waterline breaks that have taken place on Wingate’s campus and in the surrounding areas.
The town's current backhoe is 14 years old and has provided Wingate with 14 years of service for a total of about 3800 hours of service, commissioners were told.
The town of Wingate is purchasing the new backhoe for $41,000. That’s about half of what an average used backhoe cost. Commissioner Johnny Jacumin said, “I think it would be foolish not to move forward with this.” Preceding this statement, the Commissioners voted unanimously to purchase the new backhoe.
Commissioners also approved a contract for the Diane Street Sewer Rehab Project. This will cost around $500,000, but only 14 percent of that is coming from the town budget. The rest will be made up from grants.
Commissioners are looking for land in Wingate to build a new town hall and police department. They found a place right off Highway 74, but a building is currently located there. The contract that the commissioners approved will allow them to get estimates on demolition and constructing a new building.
Once they have all the estimates, they will seek approval to go ahead and start the project.