Category: News

Fairfield Memorial Hospital may be getting more serious about collecting outstanding medical bills, as members of the hospital’s administration presented a proposal to County Council Monday night to consider garnishing the salaries of those who fail to settle their accounts. The hospital also put forward a proposal to place liens against property and other assets of those critically behind on their bills.

The proposal met with a mixed response from Council members, some of whom sympathized with a hospital trying to make ends meet, while other members were reluctant to put a further burden on the needy.

In addition to the new policies for collecting debts, Tim Mitchell, the hospital’s Chief Financial Officer, also offered a change to the hospital’s charity care program, which, he said, was more liberal than a similar policy administered by the State. The hospital’s policy, Mitchell said, has been strictly based on income. The proposed change would include assets as well as income, bringing it in line with the State’s policy. Mitchell also said that the hospital loses between $5 million and $6 million each year in free care, and some of that could be recouped from patients who may have the ability to pay some or all of their hospital bills, but simply aren’t doing so.

“I don’t think this penalizes any of our citizens who don’t have the ability to pay their hospital bill,” Mitchell said. “What (the new policies) do is tie up a loose end for those who do have the ability to pay by means of liquidating an asset or by tapping their savings account where they have money sitting. Right now, the current policies are based on income levels alone and are not taking into consideration any cash or savings they may have squirreled away for a rainy day. And an unforeseen medical expense is something we believe that cash should be spent on.”

Councilman Kamau Marcharia asked Mitchell if that approach redefined the word “charity.”

“I don’t think it redefines it, because we’re still providing care to those who don’t have the ability to pay for it,” Mitchell answered. “What it’s doing is, essentially, preventing people from abusing our policy and getting care at a discount or for free who have the ability to pay.”

Mitchell said the hospital would now take the same information that patients seeking free or discounted care provide on State forms and incorporate that data into the hospital’s charity care program.

“Only by collecting from people who have the ability to pay can we pay for services for those who are truly needy,” Mitchell said.

Hospital CEO Mike Williams said that the hospital’s emergency room has seen 907 more patients this year compared to last year, with many Fairfield residents using the emergency room as their source of primary care. This has helped put a strain on the hospital’s resources, he said, and it was essential that residents find a “medical home.”

Vice Chairman Dwayne Perry said the hospital in Allendale has adopted a similar method for collection with considerable success, more than doubling their collections.

“The taxpayers and the County support this hospital, and we want to make sure we are serving the folks who are the most needy,” Perry said.

But Council Chairman David Ferguson said he was less than comfortable with some parts of the new collection process.

“One of the things I do have a problem with is the garnishing of wages,” Ferguson said. “I agree with Mr. Perry that when services are rendered we need to make arrangements for those services to be paid for. But to go to an employment place and garnish wages, that’s a pretty drastic step. I’m not sure if I would be comfortable with doing that.”

Mitchell said the wage garnishing program would only attack debts over $300 and would be limited to a certain percentage of an individual’s income. In Allendale, that method has generated $500,000, Mitchell said.

“If the hospital goes out of business because they’re not making enough money, where are these people who are not paying going to go?” Councilman David Brown asked. “It’s working in Allendale County.”

While Council member Carolyn Robinson noted that Council actually had no legal authority to deny the hospital’s proposal, Ferguson said the new policies would be placed on the agenda for the Dec. 10 meeting for a formal vote.

“I would still like to see some details (of the collection program),” Ferguson said. “If it helps the hospital, that’s a great thing. If it helps the hospital on somebody’s back who can’t afford it, that’s a different thing.”

Tuesday night, at Winnsboro’s Town Hall, more 30 citizens showed up at the regular Town Council meeting to show their support for the Friends of Mt. Zion Institute. Vicki Dobbs, co-chairman of the committee, presented Council with a proposal to financially participate in the renovation of the Mt. Zion Institute. After receiving pledges for the last year, Dobbs said the committee is ready to move forward. However, the Winnsboro Town Council has found itself in an awkward situation with the Mt. Zion Institute failing to meet current property maintenance codes.

Dobbs acknowledged the council’s predicament.

“We know you’re on the hot seat with the state of the (Mt. Zion Institute) property,” Dobbs told Council.

The hope has been that the Dru Blair School of Art would soon move into the building, but despite progress made toward that goal over the last six months, Doug Moore said he believes that dream is still quite far down the line.

“We will not be able to move into there (Mt. Zion Institute) for at least five years,” he said.

In the face of that news, Dobbs is still optimistic that renovations can move forward to save the historic building.

“We believe that the Mt. Zion project can move on without Dru Blair and Dru Blair can also move on without the Mt. Zion Institute,” Dobbs said, while adding that the art college was “a good fit.”

Red Clay Development currently owns the Mt. Zion Institute and its representative, James Maynard, met with the Council in an executive session to discuss the legal and contractual progress. After meeting behind closed doors for roughly two hours, Council accepted the information presented by Maynard and will further discuss the progress at the next town council meeting on Dec. 18.

In other business, Town Council approved a motion to proclaim Friday, Dec. 7 as Arbor Day. Arbor Day is a holiday recognized throughout the nation and the world for the planting of trees. It was begun by J. Sterling Morton in 1872 when he proposed to the Nebraska Board of Agriculture that a special day be set aside for the planting of trees. Mayor Roger Gaddy encourages citizens to participate in this holiday to promote the well-being of this and future generations.

“If you go out and plant a tree then, that would be great,” he said. “And if you plant more than one, then that would be even better.”

During Council’s Nov. 20 meeting, town Finance Director Kathy Belton confirmed Winnsboro is in a good spot financially.

“We are right where we should be,” Belton said.

Admittedly, compared to 2011 the town does have more expenditures but also has more revenue. In comparison to last year at this time the town has generated $66,064 more revenue. Town Council members approved the motion to grant all town employees with a Christmas bonus to be paid for out of the savings of the workman’s compensation fund. Last year town employees were given a bonus of $600.

Council also voted yes for one capital expense request and postponed another. The request approved was for a new HVAC system at the town of Winnsboro’s maintenance shop. The existing system was installed in 1975 and certain replacement parts are no longer available. The low bid was won by John C. Stewart & Co. at $14,050 and councilman Clyde Sanders was in full support.

“We need to be able to provide a comfortable environment for the town’s employees,” Sanders said.

The capital expense request postponed was made by Jesse Douglas for a sewer line replacement. Town manager Don Wood said he would like to a little more time to review all the facts.

“We had some last minute information come up,” Wood explained. “We decided to table that request until the next meeting.”

As a part of new business, the council approved the proclamation for the Town of Winnsboro to adopt the S.C. Municipal Association’s legislative priorities for 2013. The proclamation confirmed that as of Nov. 20 the Town of Winnsboro will support the Municipal Association’s legislative priorities to encourage local decision making by the local elected officials that govern the state’s 270 cities and towns.

To close out the meeting, council members decided to donate to both Walk One’s and the Good Samaritan House’s Thanksgiving meals for the under-privileged.

When the charter committee of the Fairfield Regional Water Authority meets again in January they may be no closer to forming a united front to challenge the county’s water issues. Monday night, Fairfield County Council took discussion of their participation in the Authority into executive session and emerged with no final decision on formally joining the alliance.

After the meeting, Council Chairman David Ferguson said he was concerned that the process was moving too fast, and that he would like to see more details on how the Authority would be governed and what each entity would be putting on the table before committing taxpayers to the Authority.

At the committee’s initial meeting Nov. 14, the group elected Winnsboro Mayor Roger Gaddy as chairman. Margaret C. Pope, an attorney with the Pope Zeigler law firm, told the committee members that each entity must first pass a resolution, committing themselves to the Authority. After the public hearings and resolutions, the members were scheduled to meet again Jan. 23 to hammer out their bylaws.

But Monday night, County Council made no such move toward offering up such a resolution, making it unlikely the public hearing process would be completed before Jan. 23. Ferguson said he felt like the bylaws should be discussed first, before any resolution.

During their brief Nov. 26 meeting, Fairfield County Council gave the OK to two new members for a pair of local boards before retiring into executive session. Council unanimously approved Frank E. McKinney for service on the Council on Aging, while Catherine H. Fantry was approved to serve on the Hospital Board with one abstention from Council member Mary Lynn Kinley (District 6). Kinley works for Fairfield Memorial Hospital.

With the end of the year approaching, Shryll Brown, Clerk to Council, told Council she was preparing a list of upcoming vacancies on County boards for the County to consider for nominations.

Council’s next scheduled meeting is Dec. 10 at 6 p.m.

On Nov. 27, Richland County Council voted to rezone 10 acres of property located at the corner of Longtown Road and Longtown Road East (at the main entrance to LongCreek Plantation) from RURAL to Medium Density-Residential (RS-MD.)

After a year-long battle against the rezoning, residents now worry that the developer will have time to apply for a Green Code designation that could result in a significantly higher density development than exists elsewhere in LongCreek.

The Blythewood Planning Commission met on Tuesday night to address concerns expressed by some business owners over town hall’s proposed zoning restrictions on commercial properties located in downtown Blythewood – an area that Council has designated to become a Town Center District.

At a recent public hearing for the proposed zoning changes, several business owners said the new ordinance would negatively affect their businesses in the long term.

Under the proposed ordinance some current businesses, like the town’s new Palmetto Gold and Pawn would become non-conforming businesses. That means, should the pawn shop decide to move to a different location in the district, expand or rebuild, it would not be allowed to do so.

At the Nov. 19 public hearing, a co-owner of the Blythewood Gold and Pawn, Victor Kocher, said his business was in the same category as businesses like antique stores and consignment shops which are allowed under the proposed zoning ordinance. He said he felt his business should somehow be exempted from the ordinance just as antique stores and consignment shops are exempted.

The Planning Commission agreed with Kocher on Tuesday night and voted to recommend that pawn shops be included in the same classification as consignment and antique shops which are allowed outright.

Another business owner who told Town Council that he would be negatively impacted by the ordinance, Dwayne Bohannon, owner of the Storage Express on Community Road, also objected to the zoning changes. At the Planning Commission meeting, Town Administrator John Perry told the Commissioners that Bohannon was in the middle of an expansion plan that would eliminate his current outdoor storage. Under the proposed zoning, Bohannon would be prohibited from continuing this expansion.

The Commission voted to re-route the zoning boundary around the storage business’s property to exclude it from the Town Center District.

No other changes to the proposed zoning ordinance were recommended by the Commission. The Commission’s recommendations now go to Town Council for a second and final vote, possibly at the December Town Council meeting. The public will again have the opportunity to address Council before that vote.

In other business, the Commission recommended that Council pass a reworked and combined Tree and Landscape ordinance.

In his staff report, Perry said he was looking into pursuing charging a fee in lieu of a court appearance for violations of some of the Town’s ordinances. In the past, all violations of Town ordinances had to be resolved in court.

Perry said he was also looking at proposing a noise ordinance and a mobile sign ordinance for the town. He also said he would propose that residents seeking approval for certain types of home businesses be approved at town hall rather than go before the Board of Zoning Appeal for an exception. Under such a proposal, Perry said the resident business owner would come to Town Hall, pay a fee and obtain a business license.

The next Town Council meeting will be held on Dec. 17 at 7:30 p.m. at the Blythewood Community Center on Blythewood Road across from the Food Lion shopping area.

An ordinance to greatly change the official zoning map of the downtown commercial area in Blythewood passed the first of two required votes by Town Council almost unnoticed on Sept. 24 of this year. But as the little white zoning signs began popping up on all downtown commercial properties (and 19 outside the downtown) a month or so later, heralding a public hearing and the second and final vote to make the ordinance the law of the Town, some business and commercial property owners have taken note and started asking questions.

And those questions could be warranted, considering that the Town’s Planning Commission Chairman, Mike Switzer, publicly aired his opinion that “the new zoning classification ordinance is one of, if not the most important and urgent of the Master Plan’s recommendations.”

In a speech to his fellow Commissioners as well as to those in the audience who might speak to the issue, Switzer explained that it is understandable to fear change. So, Switzer said, the town’s “government and businesses reached out to the community to address these fears and the need for change.”

What resulted, Switzer said, was the town “hiring a respected consulting firm with expertise in planning for smart growth.” He said the town then “held many public meetings, known as charettes, which were widely participated in.”

Switzer said the “Master Plan was then vetted again throughout the community, in the newspaper, online and in public hearings and finally passed by the Town Council over two years ago.”

Switzer said that a consensus of support was built from businesses and citizens for the Master Plan.

As Switzer pointed out, the biggest changes occur in the Town Center District which, he said, “previously had only a zoning designation of General Commercial.”

However, a review of the town’s color-coded zoning map shows two other more restrictive commercial zoning designations in that area of Neighborhood Commercial and Office Commercial.

Under the Town’s current zoning regulations, there are only those three commercial designations. Under the proposed zoning ordinance, there will be six commercial zoning designations: (from most to least restrictive) Neighborhood Office, Neighborhood Commercial, Multi-Neighborhood Office, Multi-Neighborhood Commercial, Town Center District  and Community Commercial.

According to Switzer, “these zoning changes were recommended by the Master Plan so as to allow for a gradual scaling of commercial development in Blythewood and to provide the design guidelines that will allow the town to achieve the goals envisioned in the Master Plan.