Health Committee: Accomplishments

Board of Health and Community Services Board
- Members of both boards have received training from the state due to the legislature's action

Board of Health and Health Committee
- Initiated quarterly joint meetings of the two groups to ensure open communication and joint setting of goals

OASAS (Office of Alcohol and Substance Abuse Services) funding
- Received money that we hadn't received previously and which would have gone to other counties had we not lobbied for it

Psychiatry Services
- We have ensured that psychiatrists' time spent on clinical work is maximized, so that we don't pay hourly rates for excessive non-clinical work
- Created a part-time staff psychiatrist position

Autism
- A local autism classroom for pre-schoolers is being operated by the Rackers Center (opened September 2005)
- The availability of a local option means that county children in need of this service no longer have to take long bus rides to Onondaga, Broome, or Tompkins County
- In addition to not forcing young children to endure lengthy bus rides to reach out-of-county sites, we do not have to pay nearly as much in transportation costs as we used to
- We can coordinate the educational program for pre-schoolers in this program with local school programs, making the transition as seamless as possible, for the benefit of the kids in the program

Early Intervention/Pre-school
- A new service provider is in the process of applying for approval to open an office in Cortland County, bringing needed competition to this area
- A competitor will challenge Rackers Center to offer more flexible programming, potentially saving the county money (e.g., half day programs instead of full day only programs)

Community Home Health Agency
- Improvement in items that had been deemed out of compliance with state standards on prior surveys has been made; the state surveyors now regard our CHHA as compliant with standards

Cooperation in delivery of services with Cortland Memorial Hospital
- We expanded the pool of speech language pathology providers without taking on the cost of hiring a new county employee

Hospice
- Our Health Department runs one of the state's most efficient Hospice programs, bringing comfort, symptomatic treatment, and support to the terminally ill and their families
- We have approved the creation of a part-time nursing position, as the program can demonstrate its efficient operation, even with the addition of another part-time employee