By Richard Stephens

BEATTY — Nevada Health Centers CEO Tom Chase was chided by County Commissioner Joni Eastley at the Beatty Town Advisory Board’s Feb. 8 meeting for asking the board for reimbursement for some of the cost of recruiting a health care provider for the Beatty Clinic. Chase was asking for $9,000 to cover half of the amount NHC paid to a recruiting firm.
Board member Erika Gerling said that the contract NHC signed with the county already included the cost of recruitment, to which Chase replied, “I don’t see it that way, but I respect that viewpoint.”
Eastley said she was “offended and upset” that Chase would go to the town board “behind our back to make up the difference,” after NHC had reduced their original contract proposal by $20,000, and called it a “bad faith agreement.”
“By no means did I mean to circumvent the county commission,” Chase apologized.
The request died for lack of a motion from the board.
Chase fielded a number of questions from the audience regarding its operation of the clinic. Jim Weeks pointed out that Beatty Health and Welfare provides the building rent-free and also pays for the utilities, so NHC was already being subsidized by the town.
Chase said some of the cost of operating the clinic is not local, but has to do with services provided by the parent company, such as billing, insurance, accounting, training, and recruitment. Figures he provided showed the Beatty clinic $17,877.68 in the red for last year and in the range of minus $50,000 for each of the previous two years.
The board revisited the previous meeting’s motion to provide $400 per month in housing assistance as an incentive for the current provider, nurse practitioner Diane McGinnis. McGinnis will be living in Beatty five days a week and going home to her family in Las Vegas on weekends.
Chairman Dick Gardner explained that the idea of reconsidering the matter had to do with a mix-up that led some interested citizens to believe that the item had been pulled from last meeting’s agenda, so they had not been in attendance. After considerable discussion, the board again voted to provide the assistance through the end of the current contract with NHC, at which time they will consider it again depending on whether the contract is renewed. This time the vote was 4-0.
Gerling, who voted no last time, voted yes, and board member Crystal Taylor was absent. Kelly Carroll disclosed that his wife will be working for Nye Regional Medical Center at their new facility in Beatty, but that this would not affect his voting.
Doug Farinholt said that Nye Regional now has a doctor for Beatty who would be attending a future board meeting to introduce himself. The question was raised whether the same type of housing assistance might be provided for the doctor, to which Gerling replied it would have to be agendized as an item for the board to consider.
Gerling requested that the town board be directly involved in interviewing future health care provider candidates and in discussing incentive packages with them, rather than having this done only by the Red Carpet Committee.
McGinnis introduced herself to the board and audience, saying she “felt very, very welcome in Beatty.” She said she had opportunities for jobs in Las Vegas but is “very excited to be here, to work in conjunction with Nye Regional.”
The board’s newest member, Randy Reed, submitted an item for choosing a town ordinance to review and possibly modify. He suggested starting with the ordinance having to do with water. He said that was one “we might get rid of because we have the Water and Sanitation District.”
Eastley suggested that they simply submit it to the Nye County District Attorney’s Office to see if it could simply be deleted, and the board directed the town secretary to follow her recommendation.
Shirley Harlan, a 50-year resident of Beatty, received the board’s Good Citizen Award for the first quarter of 2012 in recognition of her service to the Beatty Library, the Habitat Committee and the Nature Conservancy.
Harlan said that the Habitat Committee has been working with the Nevada Department of Transportation to acquire properties along the proposed walking trail from the narrows to behind the Stagecoach.
She said that NDOT had agreed to donate the land to the Committee, and that the Nature Conservancy had agreed to be the title holder. This donation includes the piece of property between the NDOT yard and the river where the Committee plans to develop a pocket park.
With the NDOT donation and other anticipated private donations of property, Harlan says, “we feel we will soon have 90 percent of the area” for the trail project.