By Jennifer Eisenbart
Editor
When Jan. 1 rolls around, the City of Burlington will be served by a new public health provider.
Central Racine County Health Department will slide into the hole left by the closing of Western Racine County Health, and Mayor Bob Miller expects the switch to go well.
“It’s all in place, and it should go smoothly,” Miller said.
On Monday, Miller said city government has had little to resolve, other than inking the contract.
“They’ve taken care of just about everything that had to be taken care of,” Miller explained. “There wasn’t a whole lot that the city had to do once the contracts were signed.”
Western Racine County Health had served the City and Town of Burlington, as well Raymond, Dover, Rochester, Waterford, Norway and Yorkville. All are making the switch to Central Racine, which is in Franksville at 10005 Northwestern Ave., in the U.S. Bank building.
The telephone number is (262) 898-4460, and the website address is www.crchd.com.
Miller said about the only visible difference will be the lack of an office in Burlington.
“The only thing that won’t be obviously present is an office here in town,” Miller said.
Because of that some services are switching sites. The WIC program – which provides nutrition assistance for mothers and children who meet income and family size guidelines – will be held at Love Inc. in Burlington beginning Jan. 6, for the first three Tuesdays of every month.
Love Inc. Executive Director Bill Schoessling expected about 30-40 new visitors to be coming through the service agency every Tuesday.
“It’s the same space Women’s Resource Center uses,” Schoessling said. “(Now WRC) will be here on Fridays instead of Tuesday.”
In addition, the Health Care Network – a low-cost health care program provided for those with limited income and no insurance, a non-profit that was housed at Western Racine Health – will be available out of Aurora Health Center, 818 Forrest Lane, Waterford, as of Jan. 1.
Participants have to call Vickie at (262) 514-8154 to set up an appointment.
Margaret Gesner, the health officer for Central Racine Health, said a newsletter will be going out soon to residents outlining all the programming and resources.
“Most residents should not see much of a change, because most public health is population,” Gesner said. “We look at the population in the aggregate, vs. an individual. We look across all the communities together.”
Direct services will continue to be available, including home visitation programs for “pregnant and parenting families,” immunization appointments and adult services such as car-seat checks, rabies investigations, radon test kits, etc.
“There’s myriad of programs and services that people will continue to have access to,” Gesner added.
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