The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Selectmen OK $13,000 for health district’s COVID costs
PORTLAND — Facing a financial strain after nearly a year of the coronavirus pandemic, the Chatham Health District will be getting some relief.
The Board of Selectmen has approved allocating just more than $13,000 in additional funding for CHD, which is made up of and funded by six area towns: Colchester, East
Haddam, East Hampton, Hebron, Marlborough and Portland.
District Health Director Russell S. Melmed notified the chief executives of the member towns in December about the impact of the pandemic on the health district.
“I know you will all agreed that (CHD) has shouldered a significant portion of our collective COVID-19 response in our municipalities,” he wrote. “Over the past nine months, my time and the time of my staff has been largely focused on COVID-19 response activities.”
He said the district has taken on a number of activities during the pandemic, including “providing public education, distributing PPE (personal protective equipment), conducting contract tracing, expanding access to community testing, clarifying and enforcing executive orders [issued by Gov. Ned Lamont] and DECD (Department of Economic and Community Development) sector rules, supporting day care and our school districts, providing guidance to small businesses, and directly engaging in operations planning for municipal departments such as libraries, senior centers, transfer stations
and town halls.”
He asked the six towns to donate a total of $93,118 in additional funding to aid the district as it moves on to vaccinating residents.
The money will come from Municipal COVID Relief Fund allotments that were made to each municipality as part of the federal stimulus package, and the amounts are broken down by each town’s population.
Under the proposal, Portland would contribute $13,336.40.
In preparation of the selectmen’s meeting on Wednesday, Melmed sent First Selectwoman Susan S. Bransfield a more precise estimate for anticipated costs.
The list calls for hiring a vaccine clinic coordinator (at a cost of $42,120) as well as elevating a part-time COVID-19 response coordinator to full-time status (an increase of $14,314).
As the district expands its vaccine clinics, staff overtime will rise as well, by as much as $29,952, Melmed said.
There also are additional costs for food and mileage included on his list.
Bransfield shared the breakdown with board members in advance of the meeting.
“These [vaccination] clinics are not free,” selectmen were told.
“Russ and his staff have been working extremely hard,” Bransfield said. “So much so that (hiring) this additional staff is necessary.”
Melmed’s proposal to ask each town to commit 20 percent of the CRF allotments “seems like the fairest way to do it,” Selectman Edward J. Sharr Jr. said.
There were no objections to the motion to allocate the $13,336.40 to the district.
Two other district towns, Hebron and Marlborough, already have approved allocations, Melmed said in an email Thursday, with Marlborough having already sent its check for $8,92360.