A.G. Gancarski
The funding crisis for UF Health, Jacksonville’s only Level 1 trauma hospital and safety net hospital, continues. And Jacksonville is looking to Tallahassee to resolve it.
After a meeting to discuss Consolidation Task Force recommendations where much of it focused on UF Health and other public health issues, Chief of Staff Kerri Stewart noted that talks between the hospital and the city are on hold right now, pending what comes out of Tallahassee.
During the meeting, Stewart had said talks were “stalled,” but when asked to clarify, she amended that talks were not “stalled” but “on hold.”
“We’ll be back discussing financial issues with them,” Stewart said, noting that the Rick Scott budget increased funding for UF Health by $19 million, and that “UF Health is looking to receive funding at the state level this year.”
Meanwhile, the House and Senate budgets are less favorable, but the governor’s budget gives Stewart and the Curry administration cause for optimism. The budget, she said, demonstrated that Jacksonville has “done everything the governor has asked,” and, for now, the city is in “advocacy mode,” with its lobbyists focusing on appropriations bills and the infrastructure sales surtax.
During the meeting, Stewart and Council Vice President Lori Boyer, along with Bill Gulliford, talked about the fiscal issues UF Health faces.
One such move in UF Health’s favor discussed earlier: the “switched-up payer mix” created by the new Northside facility, the so-called “North Campus.”
However, an issue Gulliford brought up was perception. He noted a conversation with someone who told him, “I didn’t like being treated next to a guy on a gurney who was chained to it. They don’t do a good job of separating” prisoners from patients.
That issue is created by overcrowding borne of necessity Stewart said. “In order to remain Trauma (Level) 1 they have to have all services on site.”
“We’re going to have to get imaginative,” Gulliford said, regarding getting city workers to use UF Health, noting that they have more facilities locally than any other provider.
