EDUCATION AND AVIATION Modern Elizabeth city is a vibrant metropolis of about 19,000, which swells to about 25,000 during the school year when students fill its three institutions of higher learning: Elizabeth City State University (ECSU), an Historically Black College with a highlyranked aviation program; Mid-Atlantic Christian University (formerly Roanoke Bible College), a private Christian school that competes in Division I-NCAA athletics; and the College of the Albemarle, one of the largest community colleges in the state that helps provide the region with many of its trained workplace employees, particularly in the medical space. Elizabeth City is also home to Base Elizabeth City, a regional command center of the United States Coast Guard, whose Coast Guard Aviation Logistics Center (ALC) provides centralized logistics support and procurement services for all of the Coast Guard’s 26 regional air stations; whose Aviation Technical Training Center trains every enlisted Coast Guard mechanic and electrician in its fleet; and whose Coast Guard Air Station Elizabeth City maintains, repairs, and overhauls every one of the service’s 200-plus aircraft every four years, making it largely responsible for the U.S. Coast Guard’s world-wide aircraft readiness. A CITY ON THE MOVE Today, Elizabeth City is “on the move,” according to City Manager, Montre’ D. Freeman. “The city has grown by leaps and bounds,” he states. “The sale of property is tremendous; homes are turning over in seven to ten days from market to close; bidding wars are happening overnight. It’s an exciting time to be a resident of Elizabeth City, North Carolina.” Mayor E. Kirk Rivers agrees. “We’re excited to have people looking to relocate to the city and the Pasquotank area,” he says.“And we’re also going at great speed in our business corridor. We have a brand new hospital being built; it’s a flagship project that will be a game changer.” Freeman explains: “Sentara Health is currently building a $210 million hospital campus that will service eight counties close to the city,but will have an impact across the state. You can imagine that for a city with a $77 million budget, to have an entity like Sentara to make a $210 million investment is a huge deal.” (Sentara Health is one of the largest health systems in the mid-Atlantic and southeast states with 30,000 employees and 12 hospitals in Virginia and northeastern North Carolina, as well as health plans for more than one million customers in Virginia and Florida.) 159 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 05, ISSUE 10 ELIZABETH CITY, NC
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