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Three big issues weighed heavily upon the Wrangell Assembly’s agenda Tuesday; impending crises with the city’s water supply, its hospital’s financial stability, and the state’s site selection for a monofill to house treated lead-contaminated soil extracted from the former Byford junkyard. • Water crisis The city entered its highest watch level for water conservation Tuesday, after learning that its two reservoirs only have about 30 or so days’ worth of raw reserves. (see adjoining story) Reservoir levels have reached a low point after an un...
Wrangell Medical Center Foundation last month issued a letter to supporters informing them it would forgo its annual fundraiser weekend this year. For the past ten years the Brian Gilbert Memorial Golf Tournament and fundraiser dinner is hosted in Wrangell each May in order to raise money for the Foundation. The Foundation is a nonprofit dedicated to support the community’s medical needs. The funds it handles fills a few roles, primarily supporting WMC’s bid for a new facility but also procuring new equipment, funding its cancer-related tra...
Assembly members commiserated with city and hospital staff on Monday to discuss how to move forward on new organizational arrangement at Wrangell Medical Center. Currently the hospital is a public asset, managed by the City and Borough of Wrangell. For several years it has been contending with inconsistent revenues and cash reserve concerns, and in the event of a default the city would be liable for any outstanding debts. In 2015 the Assembly approved a reserve source of interest-free funds of up to $500,000 for WMC to draw from in case of...
Wrangell Medical Center passed its annual financial audit without complaint, though its cash flow situation is still not in the best of health. Financial officer Doran Hammett ran down the numbers for members of the hospital’s governing board during their monthly meeting December 20. Revenues for the past five months still are lagging behind expectation, around eight percent below budget. Expenses have also been lower than expected, by about six percent, but the hospital is nonetheless running at around a $224,460 loss for the 2018 fiscal y...
At its regular meeting Tuesday, the Borough Assembly approved moving ahead with seeking a consultant on the hospital’s future, while members also learned city computers had been targeted by a hacking attack. A letter recommending hiring a consultant had been submitted to the city by the Wrangell Medical Center governing board last month. Currently the hospital is a municipal service, but recent cash flow troubles and sizable costs for a replacement facility have had administrators and elected officials alike considering other alternatives. A...
Following talks earlier this month with the city, the hospital board drafted a letter requesting that it move forward with finding a third party partnership. At their November 15 meeting, Wrangell Medical Center governing board members discussed the pros and potential cons of partnering up with another organization. A major reason for considering the move is seeking out project support for construction of a new medical facility, an elusive goal for much of the past decade. Among the board’s more immediate concerns is maintaining cash flow to t...
In a special workshop at City Hall on Monday, administrators at Wrangell Medical Center and members of its governing board met with the City and Borough Assembly to discuss the cost of a new facility. The municipally-managed hospital has been interested in constructing a new facility for at least a decade, with its current building in use already for the past four decades posing a number of maintenance and compliance issues. The Assembly had directed WMC staff a year ago to seek architectural...
Monday, Oct. 30 Report of Trespassing. Bear sighting. Arrested Tasha McColloch, 32, on charges of DUI. Suspicious circumstance. Tuesday, Oct. 31 Parking complaint. Report of trespass. Citizen Assist: Officer unlock vehicle. Report of gunshots: Officer UTL. Wednesday, Nov. 1 Welfare check. Criminal mischief. Disturbance. Agency Assist: WMC. Thursday, Nov. 2 Traffic stop: Verbal warning for driving habits. Suspicious smell. Friday, Nov. 3 Disturbance: Criminal mischief. Citizen Assist: Civil stand-by. Agency Assist. Found property: Firearms:...
The City and Borough Assembly authorized a pair of grants to be applied for in its name while narrowly nixing a third. Meeting Tuesday, the first item the body considered was participation in the Community Development Block Grant program offered by the Department of Agriculture. An application put forward to the program for $304,297 in funding would fund just over half of rehabilitation work to the building envelope of the Public Safety Building. A recently revised cost estimate for the project put together by Jensen Yorba Lott totals...
The hospital is scheduled to implement a new smoke-free campus policy at the start of the new year. Wrangell Medical Center administrators and key staff signed the new policy on October 24, to take effect on January 1. Currently the hospital sports designated smoking areas for staff, patients and visitors, one of the few hospitals in the state still to do so, reckons Scott Glaze, WMC compliance and risk manager. Its health provision counterpart Alaska Island Community Services has had such a policy in place since February 2015. The new policy...
Cash flow problems have again been ailing Wrangell Medical Center, with the public hospital putting forward a request for $250,000 to the city on Tuesday. At its own board meeting on October 18, WMC’s chief financial officer, Doran Hammett, explained the situation. Cash on hand had by the end of September dropped to $311,069, down from $838,604 at the start of the fiscal year on July 1. It costs around $28,000 a day to operate the hospital, meaning WMC had only around 11 days’ worth available for its payroll and other expenditures. The hos...
At Wrangell’s regular meeting of the Borough Assembly Tuesday, members opted not to withdraw their opposition to a proposed timber sale package. The United States Forest Service has over the course of years been putting together a timber sale for Wrangell Island, of which it manages 93 percent of the borough’s land area, which has been nearing its final stages. In August the city responded to the project’s final draft record of decision with an objection letter. After speaking with staff, Tongass National Forest supervisor Earl Stewart propo...
Celebration of the state’s sesquicentennial anniversary next week in Wrangell will be on the quieter side, with the 16th annual senior luncheon and yearly flu clinic both scheduled. Island of Faith Lutheran Church is inviting area seniors to join them for lunch next Wednesday at noon. “We kind of started it when our church was newly built,” said Joan Kading, a parishioner. “It seemed like a way to honor the senior citizens of Wrangell.” The informal meal has featured homemade soups and bread, with both a vegetarian and carnivorous option to...
Results from last week's elections were certified and accepted by the City and Borough Assembly in a special meeting Monday. Turnout in the largely uncontentious October 3 municipal elections had been low, with only 16 percent of the borough's 1,721 registered voters polling in. Of these, 242 cast votes on election day, with 29 others turning in absentee ballots ahead of time. Two other ballots had been rejected, due to the voters not previously being registered in the Wrangell polling area. Of...
In a media release from Wrangell Medical Center, the hospital announced that for the month of October it will be discounting mammograms. Nationally, October is informally recognized as Breast Cancer Awareness month, during which women are encouraged to focus on this important healthcare issue. Outside of skin cancers, behind that affecting the lungs, breast cancer is the second most common form of cancer among American women. According to the American Cancer Society, the average rate of risk over a lifetime is 12 percent, or one in eight...
Long-term care programs for a pair of regional hospitals have been recognized for their quality of care. Federal organization Mountain-Pacific Quality Health named the LTC programs at Petersburg Medical Center and Wrangell Medical Center as two of its four recipients for the “Quality Achievement Award,” the other two being in Fairbanks and Ketchikan. Facilities considered for the recognition participated in a nationwide Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services collaboration, which scores programs based on their practices, resident sat...
The city’s new manager sat down with the Wrangell Assembly last week to hammer out priorities for the coming year. Beginning the position in mid-July, Lisa Von Bargen decided she preferred to work more closely with the city’s elected officials, and recommended the goal-setting work sessions as a means to that end. “In my contract with the assembly, I said I wanted to have a goal setting and work session with them to establish what the priorities were that they wanted to see done,” she explained. Preparing a list of three dozen differe...
Running unopposed for one four-year term on the Wrangell Medical Center Board Age: 45 About: "I am a stay-at-home mom. My husband started a business here, CTT Marine. We moved here about a year ago, and we want to settle here and serve our community." Why do you want to serve on the WMC Board? "We thought that the hospital board would be good for me, because we have two kids with medical issues. I've spent a lot of time in hospitals down south. Our nine-year-old was in the hospital for six...
Wrangell Medical Center is gearing up for its 10th annual golf tournament and fundraiser dinner, proceeds from which will go toward several initiatives of its Foundation. Coupled with Saturday’s banquet and auction, the Brian Gilbert Memorial Golf Tournament is one of the biggest drives benefiting the WMC Foundation each year, with the weekend last year raising just under $30,000. The Foundation is the hospital’s philanthropic arm and in the past such weekends have supported two of the Foundation’s ongoing initiatives. One of these is its cance...
With the department heads scrambling to prepare budgets before the month’s end, rate discussions and spending plans seemed inevitable at the City and Borough Assembly’s Tuesday evening meeting. High up on its agenda was a continued discussion of the city’s residential and commercial water rates, which have lagged well behind covering costs. In light of looming supply problems (see water plant story), significant capital investments ahead for a new plant, and prospective development at the Institute and former mill sites, every penny count...
In its monthly meeting the Wrangell Medical Center Board learned progress continues to be made in drawing up plans for a new hospital. Hospital chief executive officer Robert Rang informed the board that architects with Juneau firm Jensen Yorba Lott are still hammering out designs, following a site visit in mid-March. At the moment the contractors are trying to reconcile staff’s “wish list” for a future facility with applicable standards, minimizing the building’s footprint where possible. On the financial end, the accountant at BDO in Anchora...
Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC) has completed its acquisition of Alaska Island Community Services (AICS), with the transition formally taking effect on April 1. Started in 1975, SEARHC is a non-profit tribal health consortium representing 18 Native communities in the region. Among its other programs, it operates Mt. Edgecumbe Hospital and the Ethel Lund Medical Center in Juneau. One of the largest private employers in the region before the merger, the deal with AICS extends its reach to 24 communities. Established in...
Another year's Tent City Days wrapped up over the weekend, culminating in a post-roller derby party out on the town late Saturday. "It went pretty good," said Kelly Gunderson, who helped organize this year's events. "Especially with the derby girls." The Garnet Grit Betties hosted a special bout for the event. Twenty-eight women donned pads and skates and took to a converted track at the high school gym Saturday afternoon. Coming from six different communities, they formed two "mash-up" rosters...
A reboot to the local hospital’s new building project was underway last week, with key contractors on site for predevelopment work. Wrangell Medical Center CEO Robert Rang informed the hospital’s governing board at its March 15 meeting that principal architect Joann Lott and company president Wayne Jensen of Juneau-based firm Jensen Yorba Lott were in town preparing preliminary plans for a new hospital facility on Wood Street. The pair had looked over the proposed site on March 13, which is adjacent to the current Alaska Island Community Ser...
The hospital is offering a special on laboratory tests in the run-up to its annual Health Fair next month. Through March 24, Wrangell Medical Center is discounting a variety of screenings. These include a comprehensive health profile, which measures one’s blood count, cholesterol, and other components in a coronary risk profile. Other tests are for prostate specific antigen, which can indicate prostate cancer; Hemoglobin-A1C, used for diagnosing pre-diabetes and catching the disease in its early stages; thyroid stimulating hormone; and V...
