Hospital levy passes in Mineral County

MINERAL COUNTY – The doors of the Mineral Community Hospital will stay open and the facility will continue to serve the needs of Mineral County residents after voters last week decided to pass a levy that will help the hospital pay off its debts.

By a vote of 929 for and 624 against, voters on Tuesday elected to help the hospital pay off almost $1 million of its outstanding debt by approving $498,000 each year for a period not to exceed two years. Mineral Community Hospital representatives, including hospital board chair John Woodland and MCH CEO Ron Gleason, spent the last few months engaging in a variety of meetings with county residents pleading their case as to why it was important to keep the facility operating.

Gleason was on hand Tuesday, May 5 for the counting of the votes and after the unofficial results were revealed, he said he and the rest of the MCH staff were extremely thankful to the people of Mineral County for the opportunity to prove themselves worthy of the levy.

“I was very happy with the turnout,” Gleason said. “Having 900 plus people vote in favor was very gratifying for all the people who worked so hard for this. We are grateful to the people of Mineral County for giving us this chance.”

The official number of people who cast their ballots in the levy vote was 1,553. The count took place at the Mineral County Courthouse and took several county employees a few hours to compile. Gleason said, as a result of the passage of the levy, the hospital will continue to operate and that now the hard work to turn around a once ailing hospital will continue.

“We needed this chance to prove ourselves and now we need to go to work and make this hospital as good as it can be,” Gleason said.

Gleason said, in addition to continuing the work of improving the quality of health care at MCH and its financial status, he would also continue to engage the public and communicate to them how the hospital is doing.

“We are planning on being a big part of the community,” Gleason said. “We’ve tried to do our best to be a big part of the community. We are going to have a booth at the car show and at Railroad Days in Alberton and at the fair. We are going to do as many things as we can to be out there and try to connect to the public and to help people. That’s we are here for is to help people.”