UH Geauga Asks County For Help
Geauga County is seeing more than 10 times the number of COVID-19 cases than when schools and businesses were closed in March and April, said Geauga Public Health Commissioner Tom Quade.
Geauga County is seeing more than 10 times the number of COVID-19 cases than when schools and businesses were closed in March and April, said Geauga Public Health Commissioner Tom Quade.
In a social media post Nov. 12, GPH announced the county was still at a red level on the Ohio Public Health Advisory System map.
“We are also seeing increases in hospitalization and fewer available hospital beds as COVID patients are transferred here. We are on the front end of flu season and those beds could be needed,” Quade said, imploring people to consistently wear masks, wash hands and practice social distancing.
The night before, Gov. Mike DeWine addressed the public, warning about the growth of the pandemic across the state. At the end of September, the state was averaging under 1,000 cases per day, DeWine said.
“Today, we reported our second highest number of cases at nearly 5,900 cases, while yesterday, we reached the highest number yet of over 6,500 cases,” he said. “Now, I know that some people say that the only reason we are seeing more cases is because we are doing more testing. Well, we are doing more testing. But the fact is that while testing has not even doubled, cases have gone up almost four times.”
DeWine announced an update to the statewide mask mandate, first announced in late July, to include enforcement by the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation Retail Compliance Unit.
Retail establishments found in violation of orders requiring both customers and employees to wear masks — following an initial warning — will be ordered to shut down for 24 hours. Businesses already exempted by the previous mask order will still be exempt.
The Ohio Department of Health also reissued an updated order prohibiting public gatherings of 10 or more people, with exemptions for religious observances, wedding ceremonies, funeral observances and First-Amendment-protected speech. Protected speech, as outlined by ODH, includes petition or referendum circulators, newspapers, television, radio and other media services, as well as governmental meetings that are required to be open to the public.
While specifically exempted by law, most governmental entities in Geauga County moved to virtual meetings in the early stages of the pandemic.
In Chardon — an area described by Quade at the end of October, along with Chagrin Falls, as having the largest increase in cases in the county — both Chardon City Council and Chardon Schools Board of Education meetings have been held virtually since March.
Geauga County Commissioners meetings, also held in Chardon, have yet to make the transition.
Meeting In-Person
Through their fiscal authority, Geauga County Commissioners oversee the disbursement of federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act funds allocated by the state and federal government to agencies and departments within the county.
Early in the pandemic, when those funds were not yet available, county officials cited budgetary concerns to explain why commissioners were still meeting face-to-face.
On Nov. 16, County Administrator Gerry Morgan explained the delayed transition is partly due to the need for the county to purchase equipment. While remote meeting equipment is present in a conference room located in Building 8 at the county’s 470 Center St. office complex, Morgan said the equipment that previously has been used for remote meetings is departmental or personal laptops.
He said meetings held in the conference room would not allow for attendees to socially distance.
Other local governmental bodies have opted to limit attendance only to those officials needed to make a quorum.
Morgan said due to the recent uptick in cases, commissioners will begin meeting in the larger meeting room on Nov. 24, but the date when they may start doing meetings virtually is yet to be determined.
Although commissioners chambers are smaller than the large meeting room in Building 8, Morgan said anyone presenting to the commissioners is at least 6 feet away, due to the size of the conference table.
Members of the audience and county employees wear masks during the meetings as well, Morgan said. However, in past meetings, of the three commissioners, only Jim Dvorak consistently has worn a mask.
In the past week, two county employees have told the Geauga County Maple Leaf positive cases and quarantines are increasing across county departments. In response, Morgan said county offices are following ODH and GPH protocols.
“Employees’ temperatures are checked daily when the employees arrive and masks are being worn when employees are in common areas or when more than one employee is in an office,” Morgan said. “Additionally, we adapt as the governor adjusts the required actions.”
CARES Act
As CARES Act appropriations rolled through in summer and fall, commissioners approved spending on items from at-home work stations to chairs and vehicles that easily could be sanitized after use.
At their meeting Nov. 10, commissioners approved over $230,000 of similar expenses for multiple departments, including a proposed amount of over $87,000 for the Geauga County Auditor’s Office to cover the cost of video conferencing equipment in Building 8, and about $8,000 for a video conferencing setup for commissioners chambers in Building 4.
Also approved was a resolution reimbursing the county’s general fund by $1.25 million to cover salaries for the Geauga County Sheriff’s Office.
Morgan said the state, about a month and a half ago, issued guidance allowing CARES Act funds to cover public safety salaries because public safety forces are “deemed to be substantially dedicated to the coronavirus relief.”
After that encumbrance is taken into account, Morgan said some blanket funds remain to cover purchases by departments that haven’t yet been reimbursed.
On Nov. 20, he said, any money that was not encumbered by local townships, villages or cities would come back to the treasury and then be redistributed back to those that have encumbered all of their funds.
“We’re expecting there will be another influx into county funds,” Morgan explained. “At that point, we’ll be looking at the sub grants that have been requested.”
John Fitts, who chairs University Hospitals Geauga Medical Center Board of Directors, appeared alongside Donald DeCarlo, president of the hospital, to request consideration for a sub grant. The hospital has approached townships and Middlefield Village with funding requests to make up for as much as $10 million in projected lost revenue due to the pandemic, Fitts said.
“The hospital is Geauga’s hospital. It’s the only hospital in the county. We’re the largest employer in the county,” said Fitts. “We have provided significant medical support to COVID victims. Our nurses have sat there and held hands with people who’ve died. Our nurses have participated in Zoom calls with next of kin that weren’t able to be there.”
Fitts said the hospital has incurred more than $2.4 million in COVID-19-related expenses.
DeCarlo said much of the “devastating” loss in revenue for the hospital is due to a decline in elective procedures.
The loss could potentially total more than $10 million, he said, adding losses would continue over the winter due to the increase in COVID-19 cases.
“Over the past couple weeks, we have seen a significant spike,” DeCarlo said. “UH today went back and mobilized our incident command center because of the increase in the number of cases.”
COVID-19 patients are more expensive for the hospital because they tend to be much sicker than the average patient and sometimes must stay in the hospital for a month or longer, DeCarlo added.
Morgan explained the earlier encumbrance of remaining CARES Act funds was a timing issue. If the county did not have all of the funds encumbered by Nov. 20, it would lose those funds as well as eligibility for more, he said.
“There is money though,” Morgan said. “That money has not been directed specifically to a specific item or a specific area, so we need to find out what that is. That could be used for sub grants also.”
Commissioner Tim Lennon said the hospital’s request sounded more deserving than some of the other requests that have come before commissioners.
“These are clearly COVID-related medical treatments. This is, this is where the rubber hits the road,” Fitts said.
Going forward, the hospital would check with the auditor’s office and possibly increase its request, depending on how much funding is available at that point, he said.
“As Dr. DeCarlo points out, we’re moving into a second wave and there’s no CARES (Act funding) for the second wave, and we are starting to have more patients and (will) be accruing more expenses,” Fitts said. “Hopefully, the news about the Pfizer vaccine is true and that we’ll be able to start to broadly distribute that soon.”
UH Geauga will play a big role in the vaccination process and getting support from commissioners would be significant and greatly appreciated, he added.
