MODESTO BEE
ORIGINAL ARTICLE

By KEN CARLSON
BEE STAFF WRITER

Last Updated: October 16, 2005, 04:38:04 AM PDT

After a public hearing Tuesday evening, Stanislaus County supervisors could proceed with major cuts to health services for low-income residents.

At its meeting Sept. 13, the board unanimously supported a three-year plan to reduce Health Services Agency deficits that are approaching $10 million a year. Supervisors are legally required to hold Tuesday's hearing before eliminating services.

An estimated 16,000 to 19,000 county residents would be affected by the health system cuts, threatening to put more stress on hospital emergency rooms and nonprofit rural health clinics.

While it appears that supervisors support the plan, one grass-roots organization hopes they will reconsider.

"We will still be there," said Tracye Bishop, director of Congregations Building Community, a group opposing the cuts. "Our focus has been sustaining health care for everyone, including immigrants."

Virginia Madueno, a Riverbank City Council member, expressed concern about the magnitude of the proposed cuts.

She said she isn't sure if other community clinics, such as the one operated by Oak Valley Hospital in Riverbank, are equipped to handle the overflow. "I think it will create a ripple effect," she said.

The Health Services Agency would reduce patient volumes by selling its complex on Scenic Drive in Modesto, limiting capacity in its remaining eight clinics, cutting programs, increasing fees and barring adult illegal immigrants from the indigent health program.

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