Locals Discuss Hospital District

By Corey Preston, Coreypreston@miconews.com

Mound City residents working to ensure the long-term viability of a health clinic in their community were hoping a meeting scheduled for Tuesday would put some organization behind those efforts.

The meeting, slated for Tuesday evening at the Bunker Hill Community Center, was intended to begin the process of forming a Mound City-Paris Hospital District.

Forming the proposed district would allow for the raising of tax money within the district to help fund a new clinic in Mound City.

Olathe Medical Center operates the current clinic and has committed to stay in Mound City as long as plans for new space move forward. Linn County Commissioners have discussed helping to fund a new clinic, which carries an estimated cost of $360,000, but have agreed that any disbursement of the roughly $400,000 in general fund money collected by the now-defunct countywide hospital district should be divided equally between all portions of the county.

Rubie Scott, one of the organizers of the new hospital district, said the Mound City-Paris district would try to emulate the Lincoln-Scott district, which was created in the La Cygne area after the county disbanded its district and has since helped raise finances for a new clinic in La Cygne.

“This is a group of citizens who are trying to organize a hospital district of some sort that will keep a doctor in Mound City,” Scott said, noting that the hospital district would also encompass Blue Mound, Centerville and Parker. “We’re very lucky to have a doctor right now, but that building needs a lot of work on it ... We feel we need a building that will house a doctor, possibly two, in the future.”

Scott said she wasn’t sure what direction Tuesday’s meeting would take, and the results were not available at press time.

“I do know that we have a number of people interested in this, and if they bring ideas and a willingness to do some hard work, we’ll make this happen,” Scott said.

Work on the new clinic in La Cygne is scheduled to begin this summer, as is work on a new Mercy Health Systems clinic in Pleasanton.

Mound City residents, and the commission, have discussed purchasing and renovating the Baptist Church annex, for an estimated $340,000, into a 2,400 square-foot clinic or building a new facility adjacent to Auburn Pharmacy for an estimated $360,000. Olathe Medical Center, which leases the current facility from the county for free, has committed $60,000 for the cost of a new building.