Beatty Senior Center receives temporary lifeline

BEATTY — The local Senior Center got a bit of a reprieve from closing Tuesday, as the Beatty Town Advisory Board contributed $12,225 to help keep it open through the end of September. This will provide for congregate meals twice a week and will not affect home-delivered meals.

More had been requested, based partly on a large existing deficit that had accumulated when the local project council had not raised funds to cover its part of the operation.

Board member Kelly Carroll said that something should have been done early on to keep that deficit from growing. “You can’t spend money you don’t have,” he said. “We’re not absorbing that negative balance.”

Jean Adams, a member of the Amargosa Senior Center project council, said that Amargosa is in the process of starting to set their center up as a 501c3 nonprofit. This, if they do not accept Department of Aging grants, would free them from a number of restrictions and perhaps enable them to make a go of it on their own.

Board member Crystal Taylor said she had suggested privatization of the Beatty center back in June, but nothing had been done. Marty Campbell, one of the two remaining members of Beatty’s project council, said he would begin looking into it right away.

Resident Jerry Martin warned that it might take some time to get 501c3 status for the senior center. He said he had been involved in setting one up before and that the process took the better part of a year.

There was some discussion of the dwindling number of patrons at the Beatty center.

Nye County Senior Nutrition Program Financial Manager Jennie Martin said that the program was “blooming” back when Lorraine White was the site manager. She said that White “had a very charismatic personality.”

Campbell said that the main reason for the decline was that many of those who used to patronize the center had died and others had moved away.

Board Chairman Dick Gardner said that after the previous week’s meeting, which was attended by some fifty people, mostly seniors, the next day only eight people showed up for lunch at the senior center.

During this meeting the board also heard some complaints about the Beatty Clinic.

Campbell, who had also spoken on the subject at the last meeting, said that the doctors who took over the clinic from Nevada Health Centers “are not living up to their bargain.”

He said there is a doctor at the clinic only one day a week and this is nothing like the coverage they promised.

Adams also complained that Amargosa is subsidizing Beatty health care because their town board spent $38,000 to keep their clinic open with Nevada Health Centers, but now it is harder to get an appointment because their clinic is busy taking care of Beatty patients. She accused the Beatty board of not taking care of its people.

Carroll countered that Nevada Health Centers had asked Beatty for much more to keep the Beatty Clinic open—$156,000 for five days a week or $77,000 for three days a week. He said he did not know why that was so much more than what Amargosa paid.

Board Treasurer Erika Gerling said she had talked with Dr. Reiner and that the main problem was with Beatty residents not using the Beatty Clinic. She said that if they used it more, the doctor would be there more.

She also said that the clinic had worked out a problem it had with Southwest Medical billing, and that a tele-medicine facility was being installed. She said that staff in the clinic could take vitals and patients would be able to see the doctor remotely when he is not at the clinic.