Geauga Public Health District (GPHD) – Regular Meeting March 22, 2023
Meeting Details: The GPHD Board met in Regular Session at the Geauga County Administration Building, 12611 Ravenwood Drive, Suite B303, Chardon, OH, on March 22, 2023 at 5 pm. The agenda was available on the GPHD facebook page. Geauga County Automated Data Processing (ADP) live streamed this meeting and is available here At publication, the recording has been viewed 109 times.
Board Attendance: (as seated, from L to R after the election of President) here.
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Carolyn Brakey, elected President at this meeting
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Dr. Ashley Jones, Pro Tem
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Lynn Roman
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Dr. Mark Rood
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Dr. Mark Hendrickson
Staff Attendance:
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Adam Litke – Administrator
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Dr. Jeffrey Cameron - Medical Director/Health Commissioner
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Daniel Lark, Environmental Health Director
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Alta Wendell, Administration Director
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Carol Straniero – Population Health Director
Legal Counsel:
Seated in the general public were a representative from the County Commissioners, several employees of Geauga Public Health District, a reporter from the Maple Leaf, other interested citizens and several members of the Health District Advisory Council (HDAC) which is composed of representatives from all townships/municipalities (including Jonathan Tiber, Trustee for Claridon Twp and past President of HDAC, Chris Alusheff, Councilman for Aquilla Village and current HDAC President, and Jim Mueller, Russell Township Trustee). Also attending was Lake County Health Commissioner Ron Graham (sitting in the back).
Call to Order: called to order at 4:00 pm. The Pledge of Allegiance was recited.
Minutes: After discussion led by Mrs. Brakey, the minutes (with amendments) were approved for the February 22 regular meeting and the March 2, 2023 meeting. Minutes are available through January 25th here.
New Board Member - Mr. Litke extended a welcome to the newest Board member, Dr. Mark Hendrickson. He described his medical experience and his move to Newbury, which he said “...has been wonderful.”
Election of new Board President - At the request of Mr. Litke, the Agenda was revised to allow for the election of a new board president as outgoing president, Mr. Richard Piraino, did not retain his seat on the board. Mrs. Carolyn Brakey was elected President with no other nominations and no dissenting votes. Dr. Ashley Jones was again elected to the position of President Pro-Tem, with no other nominations and no dissenting votes.
Information Session
Environmental Health Update - Mr. Lark said he had several items later in the Agenda
Population Health Update - Nurse Straniero, outgoing Population Health Director, stated that there was nothing except for an update on Covid vaccines and what she submitted to the Board (not available to the public). Due to lack of need, the Covid vaccine program will be folded into the normal adult vaccination clinics which are held twice a month. The state funded program of two nurses providing Covid 19 vaccines will be discontinued. The Community Needs Assessment is available on the website
Administration Division Update - Alta Wendell, outgoing Administration Director, said that she had nothing to report other than her report that was submitted to the Board (but not provided to the public).
Observer Comment: The public can request reports but these all go to the Board attorney, Mr. Bryan Kostura, for review and approval before anything is released to the public.
Administrator/Health Commissioner Update and Finance Report - Mr. Litke reported on several items as follows:
Mr. Litke provided an update on the Parkman Well project which is funded by the OEPA and is to remedy water quality issues. Although it is presumed that the issues come from an ODOT salt storage facility, this storage facility is still in existence. Mr. Litke said that he and Dr. Hendrickson met with different representatives including Steve Demetrio (R-Bainbridge Twp., Ohio District 35) and Vernon Sykes (Ohio State Senate, District 28) and he is hoping that their involvement will result in a remedy for the issue. Five of the six identified wells have been completed after several different sites were attempted and ran into problems with high iron content. The second phase of the project, which could be up to another 10-11 wells, has not started and Mr. Litke is hoping that the Ohio EPA will also pay for those wells. There was a question raised by Dr. Rood as to why they didn’t continue with the wells with high iron and just mitigate the issue. Mr. Litke stated that the grant funds would not provide any “inside the house” mitigation of iron, so that is why they continued to drill until they found a well that was acceptable.
Proposed change of last day of work for GHD employees - Mr. Litke suggested that during New Business that the Board should consider changing the last day of work for GPHD employees from March 31 to April 1, 2023. This would permit employees to retain health insurance coverage for the month of April. For those who are offered positions with Lake, this would make it possible for them not to have a lapse in coverage. It was stated that any newly hired employees must wait one month for medical coverage to begin. See motion that passed
below.
Video presentation on Groundwater is posted here. Mr. Litke said the program was positively received.
HDAC meeting - Mr. Litke stated that he will be meeting with the HDAC on a quarterly basis, the first meeting to be held in June and open to all HDAC members as well as the public.
Contract details explored - Mr. Litke answered some questions about the contract with Lake County that were posed to the Board. These are details he offered:
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Jobs at similar levels will not see a pay decrease, rather there will be a pay increase of an additional .29/hour for some positions in offers received.
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Vacation accrual will be grandfathered for GPHD employees who accept employment at Lake. Ms. Brakey asked whether an employee would get paid out and also get vacation time. Mr. Litke said that they would not have vacation added back in, but the amount of vacation permitted would be based on their GPHD start date. If the person is not offered a position, that employee will receive a payout of vacation time.
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Sick time will carry over for those who are offered and accept employment with Lake. Mr. Litke said that they would work with employees if they needed time for a family emergency.
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Holidays are the same between the two counties (13 paid holidays) but there is one additional personal day in Lake County and Lake County employees have more paid lunch time (½ hour paid and ½ hour unpaid).
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Health Commissioner Ron Graham said that Lake County “...will take everyone we can within the parameters of the contract.” He said that there were 9 offers “ready to roll”.
Observer Note: There had been 17 employees of GPHD. According to the agreement, the following positions will be provided by Lake County: Health Commissioner, Administrator, Environmental Health Director, Medical Director, Nursing Director, and Epidemiologist. It appears then that those currently holding these positions would not be offered employment with Lake County except that the Administrator and Environmental Health Director positions are currently held by employees of Lake Health.
Reviewer Note: During the December 5, 2022 GPHD meeting, former Board President Richard Piraino expressed concern with the shared resource arrangement, noting that Mr. Litke was working 60+ hours per week at GPH when his contract called for 32 hours per week. It is unclear how the current arrangement differs or how the staff resources will be shared.
Geauga County Township Meeting - Mr. Litke announced that he would be attending the Geauga County Township meeting on April 12th.
Finance Report - This report was available to Board members, but not to the public. Ms. Brakey asked why legal fees were not included in the March report and Mr. Litke said that they would be approximately $100,000 but that there was no bill yet. Ms. Brakey asked for a line item on legal fees.
HB110 Compliance Issue Update - The attorney whose firm is handling the investigation regarding HB 110 compliance, Mr. Bryan Kostura, was not present so there was no update available except Mr. Litke said it was not complete yet. Ms. Brakey asked about reimbursing property owners that were charged. Mr. Litke said that if the Board wanted to reimburse those property owners who had paid for an inspection, but for whom no inspection was performed, they would have to authorize payment out of Reserve funds.
Old Business
Operations Planning and Administrator and Environmental Health Director Positions. The Board decided to take these items off of future Agendas. Dr. Jones said that they had notified those who had applied that they would not be hiring for those positions.
It was also announced that Dr. Cameron’s contract with the GHPD was month to month and would be terminated with 30 days notice. The Board approved of this action.
New Business
Health Commissioner/Medical Director Contract - see above
Food Service Operations and Retail Food Establishments - Mr. Lark reported that there were 40 establishments that had not renewed their licenses. Litke said that if they fail to renew there is a mandatory (State of Ohio) 25% late fee imposed. Letters have been sent to all 40 and there will be one follow up. The Board approved turning these over to the Geauga County Prosecutor’s office if they don’t get payment in the next couple weeks.
Ohio Home Sewage Treatment System Rules, Geauga County Supplemental Rules 3701-29-19(E) Regulation - The Board received this change in a handout from Mr. Lark but it was not available to the public. Mr. Lark said that this involves the 2015 law that went into effect for NPDES systems (these are systems that discharge to the surface and which discharge could reach streams - Information here.) Mr. Lark said there were 1600 systems and under the current rule sampling is required, but now it can be done by the owner’s service contractor. He said that the sampling is not being done (only 8% were done last year and only 25% met the standards). The proposed change would permit GPHD to perform the sampling. Mr. Lark went on to say that this Regulation, according to GPHD bylaws, requires that it be read three times. Ms. Brakey said they would revise the bylaws, but since there was no public reading yet, the regulation could not be changed. Mr. Lark said it would then be July by the time the regulation was changed. Observer Note: It was not clear why the regulation was not read at this meeting, or why this was not brought up during past meetings when the NPDES system was under discussion at the September 26, 2022 meeting.
Motion approved to change the last day of current employees work to April 1, 2023, instead of March 31st in order to provide health insurance through April 30.
A series of questions about the Cooperative Agreement with Lake County was asked as follows:
A South Russell Village citizen expressed the following questions:
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When did this agreement start and who in Geauga County authorized this?
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How much does the contract cost? This was done by an outside law firm, which can cost a lot.
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Why did Geauga County have only hours to decide? Did anyone see this before last week? Yes or No?
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What are the financial shortfalls that caused this document to be created?
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Why weren’t the citizens of Geauga County notified? We need answers.
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Why isn’t the legal officer here to talk about this? Who retained him?
Mr. Litke said it was Bryan Kostura and he was hired by Geauga Public Health.
Mary Briggs, Geauga County resident, expressed the following viewpoint:
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Question addressed to Ms. Roman - “At the last regular meeting and subsequent meetings, the jurisdictional contract was only under discussion. Who authorized Bryan Kostura to collaborate with two prosecutors and two other attorneys to write this document that was voted on last Wednesday 3/15?”
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Ms. Briggs said she thought it was Interesting that following last Wednesday's board meeting, a majority of board members and the Board attorney met in Mr. Litke’s office. She didn’t see an Executive Session.
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She addressed a comment to Dr. Jones: “Is it not a conflict of interest for you to be on the Environmental Health Committee and also voting on issues that impact your father and husband’s business?”
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She stated to Dr. Cameron that she was sorry that the Board hamstrung Dr. Cameron’s work as Health Commissioner.
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She started to talk about “Theft of data” but then her time was up.
Dr. Jones said that she has abided by what the Prosecutor’s office instructed her. She said she doesn’t participate in discussions about environmental health. She stated that GPHD does not have an Environmental Health Committee.
Ms. Brakey said that after the meeting last week, several board members went back to the offices but that they weren't together.
Gail Roussey League of Women Voters of Geauga (this Observer) asked for clarification regarding Commissioner Ron Graham’s comments that they would “take everyone we can within the parameters of the contract.” Would that limit to a certain number of employees or a certain level of employee?
Mr. Graham said that categories of positions are listed in the contract, and that there are some general positions open at Lake County.
Dr. Rood made the following comment about the GPHD employees: He said that he and Mrs. Roman met with employees who were convened to discuss the severance. Mr. Graham was there and the intent was to tell all employees who want to stay with Geauga Public Health to apply. Mr. Graham was supportive of that. Mr. Graham said he wanted them to find a place with Lake County. Dr. Rood said he was confident that the intention was to retain all staff who were there.
Dr. Rood also spoke to a comment made by Mr. Piraino during the March 15 GPHD meeting that Population Health was not as important. He regrets that this statement was made, but that Geauga Health does value and have passion for Population Health. Dr. Hendrickson and he are physicians; Ms. Roman has worked for innovations in health care, Dr Jones is a doctor of pharmacy and this is her life’s work. He stated, “We are passionate about providing the best opportunities to improve the health of Geauga County residents. “
Jonathan Tiber, Trustee for Claridon Twp said he has always been a fan of this Board. He said, “So often today we disagree with someone on one thing, we throw out the whole person.” He said that although he disagreed with the Board, he feels this is not a bad agreement. He said that his biggest contention was why didn’t the Board ask for a levy? He said that the Board told him that they could do this agreement and not go for a levy. He said that he respected that. He concluded that “It’s time to get behind the agreement...if this agreement is successful then GPH will be successful…let’s get behind it and we will be successful as Geauga Public Health.”
Ms. Roman responded to the levy statement by saying, “we did talk about the levy at our January meeting and at that point we realized that we didn’t know what we were pursuing and we only had two weeks to get a levy on for the spring and it would have cost this health dept. $17,000. That doesn’t say we aren’t going for a levy. We have a levy option again in the fall. The Board will make that decision.”
Mr. Tiber added that he feels, “...regardless of that, it’s time to move forward.”
Chris Alusheff, President of HDAC and Councilman for Aquilla Village - “I made my feelings clear…like Jonathan (Tiber) said, it’s over and done. . . no point in rehashing. . . we made our feelings clear. Now is the time to work collaboratively . . . it comes down to business and it’s not the end of the world.” He said that to that end, they have set up to have an HDAC meeting with GPHD in three months to get updates. He concluded that it needs to be a two-way street. His goal is to get everybody more involved and informed. “As far as Dr. Jones, I believe that you go above and beyond your statutory duties to abstain.“
Dr. Jones responded: “I appreciate that Chris and I am looking forward to collaborating with HDAC.”
M. Litke said that he hoped it can be a two-way street. He said that HDAC can bring things to the Board and that a quarterly meeting is what they will start with, including having the public come in and comment.
Mr. Tiber interjected: “What unites us? The good of Geauga County. That unites all of us “ (Mr. Litke cut him off due to the fact that he already had his two-minute comment period.)
Ms. Brakey, “I care about the First Amendment very dearly.”
Executive Session - The Board entered into Executive session at 6:22 pm to discuss pending litigation, personnel, including appointment, employment, discipline and compensation. The GPHD attorney was not present. At 7 pm, the board came out of Executive session and adjourned the meeting.
Observer Note: It is unclear whether legal counsel participated in the Executive Session.
Next regular meeting: April 26, 2023 at 5 pm. All meetings at Geauga County Administration Building, 12611 Ravenwood Drive, Suite B303, Chardon, OH.
More Information: http://gphohio.org/
Observer: Gail Roussey
Reviewer: Shelly Lewis
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