Lee County Emergency Management Director Shane Seagroves retired from his position on December 1.

Seagroves had been with Lee County as fire marshal since 2007 and became emergency management director in 2009. His combined time in local fire and emergency services spans more than 30 years.

Seagroves told The Rant he plans to transition into full time work with a private consulting company he’d recently started.

“We’ve built a successful public safety consulting business over the last two years and I’m super excited to start year three with my sole focus on building and expanding across the state,” he said. “I’ve been blessed to have worked some incredible people over the last 30 years and most importantly the citizens of Lee County are second to none.”

His retirement comes less than a month after Seagroves received the Colonel Phillip Nicholas Waters Award from the North Carolina Emergency Management Association on November 2.

The award is presented to the local emergency management director who has “demonstrated outstanding achievement in their Local Emergency Management Program and has contributed to the overall good and achievement of the Emergency Management System in the state” of North Carolina.

His award citation mentioned his service to other areas of the state during times of disaster, as well as the 2011 tornado that struck Lee County and his department’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic as examples of his service.