Longtime Dewey Beach official set to retire

After 34 years on the job, Town of Dewey Beach Administrative Assistant Joyce Pool will retire Friday, July 15.

“I just felt it was time,” she said, noting she had rebuffed her family’s previous attempts to persuade her to move to Florida and Minnesota. “My church is here.”

Pool first joined the town police department in 1988, when she was hired by former Chief Karl Klink Jr. to take care of parking tickets. 

She took the job about a year after she retired from DuPont; she and her husband Roger had recently moved to Bethany from Wilmington, and she wanted to keep busy.

At the time, town hall was located in a former cottage rental.

“The police department was on one side and town hall on the other side,” she said. “People used to come in and say they had stayed in the cottage before.”

In 1997, she transferred to the town administration side, where she has remained ever since, selling parking permits and dog licenses, providing customer service and pretty much helping wherever needed. Pool’s replacement, Laura Steiner, is already on board for a seamless transition come July 15.

Now, Pool has an entirely new role to fulfill as a volunteer for Pam An Stables outside Lewes, where she will train to groom the equine therapy horses.

“I just love horses,” she said. “I didn’t grow up around them, but we all have something that we’d like to try.”

Pool also plans to be more active with Epworth United Methodist Church and its food bank.

“I’m not going to sit around and do the TV thing,” she said.

The town has changed a lot since she took her job, Pool said. Technology has made her work easier, and the town has evolved from just a party town to one with more families and family activities, she said.

“I have really enjoyed it,” she said. “That’s for sure.”