Transfer of hospital from City of Waukon to Allamakee County would provide funding for services

WAUKON — In a question placed on the ballot, Allamakee County voters will decide whether to transfer ownership of Veterans Memorial Hospital from the City of Waukon to the county.

If Allamakee County residents approve the city-to-county conversion, property owners would see a tax increase of $1.09 per $1,000 of the net taxable value of their residential properties. This would generate $950,000 in annual appropriations to the hospital to retain existing programs like surgery and obstetrics and expand services to meet growing needs through a countywide property tax, according to hospital officials.

The owner of a home valued at $144,000 would pay $157 a year in additional property taxes to support the hospital.

For the measure to pass, residents in the City of Waukon will need to approve giving up hospital ownership and county residents will need to approve taking on the hospital, Veteran’s Memorial Hospital CEO Michael Coyle said. Both votes require a simple majority to pass. It will take about a year for the hospital to see those funds come in if the vote passes, he said.

If one vote fails, the whole thing fails, Coyle said.

Tax revenue necessary to maintain hospital services

The 25-bed critical access hospital serves six to 12 inpatients a day and sees up to 120 labor and deliveries a year. While it’s not large, Coyle said it’s “very important to folks in northeast Iowa.”

The hospital faces ongoing financial challenges similar to rural hospitals across the state. While larger hospitals profit from high patient volume and efficiencies of scale, rural hospitals with fewer patients struggle to break even.

After years of financial instability, COVID relief dollars received in 2020-21 helped temporarily offset expenses and fund minor renovations, Coyle said. The hospital also has begun to gain ground through operational improvements, expanded services and recruitment of additional medical providers. But that money will be depleted by the end of the year, Coyle said.

In March, the Waukon City Council gave its full support to file a petition to invoke a vote for a city to county conversion. A petition circulated by the hospital required at least 372 signatures to be put on the ballot for the Nov. 8 general election.

The hospital is one of the largest employers in the county with more than 250 employees and a regional economic impact of about $50 million.

Funding created by the conversion could support the following projects:

If the measure fails, Coyle said it will be hard to continue to fund hospital services and recruit health care workers. “We’ll have to put more Band-Aids on stuff instead of being able to think two or three years down the road,” he said. “You need new equipment you can count on at 2 a.m. The last thing we want to do is cut services.”

Over the last year and a half, the hospital has opened two new primary care clinics in Waukon and Postville and a behavioral health clinic last month. The community raised $600,000 in 60 days to renovate a building for one of the primary care clinics, Coyle said. The behavioral health clinic is already booked months out.

“That tells you the commitment folks in this area have for keeping their health care local,” Coyle said. “That’s something we’ll never forget. Our patients invested in us, and now we need to invest in them.”

Waukon City Manager Gary Boden said the hospital is an essential service in the city and county. Without adequate funding, there could be a reduction in services.

Allamakee County supervisor Dan Byrnes said it’s important to him to see jobs stay in the county. “People like the services at Veterans Memorial Hospital,” Byrnes said. “The vast majority of people I’ve talked to agree we have to keep this hospital in town. We have good services and good quality of care.”

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