Mattawa maintains financial support to Grant County Health District

MATTAWA — It’s what she does at city council meetings throughout the county every year.

During a virtual Mattawa City Council meeting Dec. 17, Grant County Health District Administrator Theresa Adkinson asked council members for a renewal of the agreement with her district and to consider contributing money to help support it.

While the health district is supported by the state, Adkinson said it is difficult for the organization to do everything it is mandated to do with its small staff. Because of this, cities are asked to contribute. While most cities contribute $2 or more per resident, Mattawa has historically only contributed $500.

“This hasn’t stopped us from coming to your community,” Adkinson said. “We don’t want to punish the community.”

Adkinson reported in the past year, the health district was involved in a number of different non-COVID-related activities in Mattawa, including food inspections, tuberculosis treatment, providing and installing new car seats and helping special-needs children with their health care needs.

On top of these regular duties, the health district has done all of the contact tracing for those who speak Spanish, as well as others, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Adkinson said early in the outbreak, the health district decided to keep the Spanish-speaking patients in-house and not turn them over to state contact tracers so they could provide local residents with the assurance they needed from someone who was also local. Adkinson said the health district has worked closely with local schools, clinics and employers during the pandemic.

As of the Dec. 17 meeting, the health district had contact-traced for 536 COVID-19-positive patients in the Mattawa area. Adkinson said because of this, her staff has answered questions and provided a quality of service that residents of other counties haven’t had.

“This has been a source of pride for my staff,” Adkinson said. “It has been what has helped them day in and day out. They’ve been helping residents navigate this scary disease. They almost became a case worker for a lot of them.”

The Mattawa City Council decided to continue with its historical allocation for the health district but agreed it should review the amount in the future.

“I think it is a matter of discussion of priorities,” said Councilman Brian Berghout. “We need to look at the big picture. Maybe we can allocate more and take away from other things that are less important. We don’t have to make that decision right now.”