By Heather McDonald

The Portage County Health Care Center’s (HCC) future is at a critical juncture, as County Board supervisors review a proposed 2018 budget that if passed would nearly deplete unrestricted funds in the HCC budget.

That means at the end of 2018 there would not be enough money in HCC’s budget – including its “savings” account – to operate the facility into the future.

“We won’t have the money in (2019),” Supervisor Jim Gifford said last week. “I think this is a call to act to do something now instead of kicking the can down the road, as we’ve been doing. This honestly reflects what the HCC is costing…

“We’ve got roughly a year to accomplish what we need to accomplish in order to get this on a fiscally sound basis,” he said.

The proposed 2018 budget calls for using about three-quarters of the HCC’s remaining roughly $1.5 million unrestricted fund balance in order to operate next year, with no budgetary option – at this point – for funding operations after that.

“We are suffering loses each year when it comes to the financial picture,” County Executive Patty Dreier said at the County Board budget meeting Oct. 3. “We have new regulatory requirements we have to spend money to meet, and we have building and infrastructure that needs to be (addressed).

“If it’s going to be sustained, it’s going to require a new model and a new situation,” she said.

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