Portage County nursing home referendum supporters rally before election
STEVENS POINT – Advocates for Portage County’s nursing household rallied Friday in a very last-ditch exertion to drum up additional momentum for a indeed vote on Tuesday’s referendum.
“This is our very last possibility, I think, to rally public sentiment in favor of the overall health care referendum and at times folks want to see a accumulating of like-minded people today who say this is vital and this is truly worth it,” claimed Nancy Roppe, a top advocate for the Portage County Wellbeing Treatment Middle.
On April 5, voters will decide no matter if to maintain the facility open up by boosting taxes and creating a new $20 million facility at the web site of the recent 1931 setting up, 825 Whiting Ave. About two dozen folks stood on the corner of Whiting Avenue and H2o Street waving signals at passersby, urging them to vote sure.
The Friday evening candlelight vigil also served a next goal: to demonstrate support and appreciation to the staff in scenario voters reject the system to maintain public health and fitness treatment alternatives in the county.
“At the very same time, just in case factors go the wrong way, we need to have to stand up for the men and women who operate at the facility that have built it a five-star facility for all of these years,” Roppe reported. “We want to honor the citizens.”
The vigil involved a string of two dozen names together the sidewalk’s intersection. Every single name belonged to another person at the vigil who received, or is getting, cure at the facility. Two of them belonged to Roppe — her aunt and her sister.
“We are shining a light on what we have to drop from losing this facility,” she said.
Linked:Portage County referendum asks voters to pay up to $4.5 million for 20 several years to guidance nursing property, establish new facility
Relevant:Nursing home advocates see much more at stake than income as Portage County referendum looms
Nancy and Joe Roppe have been foremost advocates to maintain the center open considering the fact that 2015. They handle a Fb team in which they livestream meetings, post highlights and alert community customers when the county can take significant techniques on the center’s foreseeable future.
They also rallied community users in 2018 when the county went to referendum for the nursing residence as the facility operated at a $1 million deficit each year because of Wisconsin’s bad Medicaid reimbursement rates. The referendum four decades in the past gained with 60% of the vote.
“I feel individuals are contemplating twice about this,” Nancy Roppe said. “Of course, you are likely to pay a lot more in taxes but you’re getting a lot more bang for your buck.”
Should voters say indeed to a new $20 million facility, the county’s upcoming phase would be to retain the services of an architect for the new creating. Construction could begin as shortly as March 2023 and would be performed in two phases as the county tears down and replaces the outdated facility. Tentative programs indicate construction could finish in January 2025.
The facility’s long term has hung in the balance for nicely about a 10 years as leaders pitched and explored designs for a economically sustainable future. At difficulty is the building’s aging infrastructure, these as heating and electrical systems, on the cusp of failing. The making also lacks energy efficiencies, a central air technique and other modern day vital elements.
The referendum is the end result of the county’s scheduling for a probable potential of a publicly owned health treatment facility. The $20 million facility would be 57,000 square feet and would include place to increase its providers, attracting a lot more personal-pay clients to offset losses brought about by weak Medicaid reimbursement prices. The facility would continue to provide skilled nursing but broaden to offer far more group-centered household amenities and physical and occupation therapy rehabilitation products and services.
“I assume we’re last but not least at the nexus and we’ll have an response on April 5. If items go the ideal the way we’ll have a shiny new facility with HVAC that works, energy that operates, heat that is effective,” Roppe claimed.
Call reporter Alan Hovorka at 715-345-2252 or [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at @ajhovorka.
