Funding comes through for clinic

Funding comes through for clinic

February 2, 2002

By Tom Vaughan
Mancos Times Editor

Valley-Wide Health Services, Inc., of Alamosa, has been awarded a federal grant of $391,875 to operate a community health center in Mancos.

The announcement was made in a Jan. 30 press release from the Health Resources and Services Administration, an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

"I say it’s time for a community celebration," said Valley-Wide CEO Marguerite Salazar on Wednesday. "Now the work begins. This is going to be the best health center yet!"

Valley-Wide had applied for $550,000 in operating funds, an amount that might also be granted to the Mancos clinic in one or more subsequent years.

In a phone call Friday, Jerry Wheeler, HRSA Denver Office field director, said it was not clear whether only 71 percent of the request was granted because part of the fiscal year has already gone by or whether HRSA did not choose to grant the full amount, which would affect the following years.

Salazar commented Thursday, "We can certainly do a great clinic for ($158,000) less. We just hate to cut corners, but in time it will be made up."

The HRSA grant is the key to a clinic plan that has been building for 21 months.

The Mancos Valley Medical Center, under Dr. Allan Burnside, closed its doors on May 26, 2000, slightly less than a year after the center acquired the practice from Mercy Medical Center.

The facility, located at 111 E. Railroad Ave., was sold to Michael and Alice O’Traynor, while an ad hoc group of citizens calling themselves the Mancos Valley Health Resources Advisory Committee began to search for ways to reopen a clinic in Mancos.

Mancos resident Mike Guillette, P.A., who had worked in the clinic when it was run by Mercy, contacted VWHS.

Salazar and Chief Operating Officer Konnie Martin came to Mancos and met with a group of citizens to describe Valley-Wide, a nonprofit corporation operating community health centers in the San Luis and Arkansas River valleys.

VWHS was asked to consider Mancos as an addition to their chain.

VWHS applied for, and received, Medically Under-served Area and Health Professional Shortage Area designations for Montezuma County. An MUA designation is a prerequisite for Valley-Wide to take on a clinic’s operation, because it heightens the reimbursements for certain types of services.

Guillette and others began to look at a location for a clinic, if it could be revived.

The O’Traynors offered to hold the former clinic building while clinic options were explored and to sell it back for use as a clinic at the price they paid for it.

The Montezuma County Hospital District indicated an interest in acquiring the clinic building. Mancos Family Dentistry owner Dale Strietzel, D.D.S., agreed to move his practice into the remodeled clinic as a paying tenant, which made it feasible for MCHD to get a low-interest loan through the USDA Rural Development program. The lease by Strietzel and the purchase of the clinic by MCHD were consummated late last month.

MCHD board President Randy Smith, on hearing of the HRSA grant, exclaimed, "That’s great!"

In the meantime, Guillette wrote for a grant from the Caring for Colorado Found-ation to remodel and reorient the building, putting the entrance to the south. That grant was approved, first for $150,000 and then for another $50,000. Colorado’s Department of Local Affairs contributed another $65,000.

The preliminary plans have been drawn by Cortez architect Charles Hubbard and approved by all parties concerned, so construction drawings and a contract to do the work should follow soon.

Valley-Wide will have 90 days to begin operation in the Mancos clinic after it receives formal notification of the grant award. Depending on how long it takes HRSA to send out the letter, Salazar says it may be possible to start seeing patients in the Mancos clinic by early May.