In a follow up to the "motion to reconsider" last week's vote against renewing SAK's management contract for the Champaign County Nursing Home: County Board and a Do-over. The board tonight quickly voted by voice vote to reconsider the motion. The only discussion for the vote itself was a statement from chairman Weibel asking the board to look in the mirror once in a while on these issues. He pointed out that there was blame to go around in the situation, from the management company not notifying them of the shortage, to their own rule standing in the way of paying the vendor even though there was money available to do so.
I'd imagine some of the Republicans would take a different view on this and may at a later date, but members appeared to want to get this special meeting over with. With no further discussion the contract renewal motion passed by voice vote this time and about as quickly as Chairman Weibel could say it, they were adjourned and the live feed went off-air (for those of us watching from cyberspace).
[UPDATE 4/25 9:37am: The News-Gazette had additional information in their coverage today:
County board reverses itself, extends nursing home manager's contractFull article here.]
It took only nine minutes for Champaign County Board members to undo what they did last Thursday.
Board members voted unanimously Tuesday night to extend the county nursing home manage ment contract with SAK Management Services until July 31...
Only county board Chairman C. Pius Weibel, a Champaign Democrat, had anything to say about the contract extension and management of the nursing home. He read from prepared remarks that absolved SAK of most of the nursing home’s problems and placed most of the blame on the county government.
“We hired SAK because we do not think we can manage the nursing home on our own. Like sideline spectators, we only see a margin of the activity that is involved in running a nursing home,” Weibel said. “So if we see anything associated with the nursing home that we do not like, we tend to blame the nursing home management.”
Weibel said the county board deserved blame for approving a rule that prevented the payment of outstanding bills to vendors...
Meanwhile, SAK President Suzanne Koenig, who did not attend Tuesday’s meeting, released a statement in which she pledged to continue managing the nursing home.
She claimed her company “has produced significant advances for the residents of the Champaign County Nursing Home, along with noteworthy improvement of the publicly owned facility’s financial position.”
Among the improvements, she said, were the replacement of temporary outside nurses with “dedicated full-time hires,” fewer bed sores, better food service and improved ratings from the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
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