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Health merger gains ground
YOUNGSTOWN
The initial step has been taken toward the possible unification of the Youngstown City and Mahoning County health districts.
Mayor Charles P. Sammarone and Matthew Stefanak, health commissioner, Mahoning County District Board of Health spoke on the matter this week and are working on setting up meetings.
It had appeared unification discussions might not take place.
Sammarone sent a letter dated Oct. 19 to Youngstown City Council, the Mahoning County commissioners and the Youngstown Health District Board saying he was is in the process of exploring the “costs and benefits associated with unification of the districts.”
“While this consideration is in an early stage, preliminary indications suggest that the merger of health districts may greatly benefit both Mahoning County and the city of Youngstown,” Sammarone said in his letter.
The letter, however, never made its way to the Mahoning County District Board of Health, and when Sammarone received no response he said if he didn’t hear back by the end of the year he would consider unification a “dead issue.”
When informed of the letter and Sammarone’s comment by a Vindicator reporter, Stefanak said he called the mayor and they agreed to begin the exploration process.
Stefanak said he will pass Sammarone’s letter along to the county health board’s District Advisory Council, composed of representatives from the townships and villages in Mahoning County. It is the advisory council that would negotiate with and enter into any agreement with city council for shared or consolidated public health services, he said.
Stefanak said the issue was discussed with the advisory council several months ago and at that time its members agreed to meet with city officials if contacted by Sammarone.
The mayor said the matter was talked about in the past when he was a city council member, but that it never rose to the formal meeting stage.
In preparation for possible discussions with the advisory council, Sammarone said he had Erin Bishop, city health district administrator, gathered information about the recent merger of Summit County, Barberton and Akron health districts to be presented at the meetings.
“We’re ready to start the process and see if it can move forward. We’ve talked in the past about possible savings. It is possible that all involved entities and the entire community may benefit from unification,” the mayor said.
Stefanak said if the parties agree to proceed, unification would likely be a multiyear process, including an amendment to the city’s charter as was done when the county health district took over the public health duties for Campbell.