The Jefferson County Health Department will close its High Ridge office permanently next year.
The Health Department Board of Trustees voted 4-0 Sept. 22 to close the office, 5684 Hwy. PP, sometime between Jan. 1, 2023, and June 30, 2023.
Board members Dennis Diehl, Tim Pigg, James Prater and Suzy Davis voted yes, and Amber Henry was not at the meeting.
That vote followed the recommendation of the board’s building subcommittee, which includes Pigg and Prater.
Health Department Director Kelley Vollmar said the office, which opened in August 2018, likely will close near June 30, 2023, rather than earlier in the year.
Vollmar said the High Ridge office will remain open 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on Wednesdays until it officially closes.
There are no plans to close the Hills-boro office, 405 Main St., or the Arnold office, 1818 Lonedell Road, which are open from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday.
Vollmar said it costs the Health Department too much to keep the High Ridge office open and staffed.
The Health Department pays $4,470 a month to rent the 6,700-square-foot High Ridge office space from the Jefferson County Library District, Vollmar said.
She also said it takes six employees to staff the High Ridge office.
“It (closing the office) was a very difficult decision to make,” she said. “We tried to look at a couple of different ways to increase numbers over there, as well as to try to find sustainable staffing, and we just kept running into roadblocks,” she said.
She said it costs the Health Department $479.45 for each client visit at the High Ridge office, compared to $54.70 per client visit at the Hillsboro office, $27.45 per visit at the Arnold office and $9.26 per visit on the wellness van.
The lease for the High Ridge office requires at least 180 days’ notice before ending it, Vollmar said.
She said no employees will be laid off when the High Ridge office is closed. They will be relocated to the other two offices or mobile units.
Vollmar said the Health Department will still offer services in the northwest part of the county after the High Ridge office is closed because the wellness van regularly will be available at the High Ridge Fire Protection District stations, the Peace Pantry in Cedar Hill and other locations in that area.
Vollmar said she believes the Health Department may provide better service to the area with the department’s six mobile units in the area.
The High Ridge office was one of three promises the Health Department made when it campaigned for and won voter approval in April 2016 for a property tax increase of 3.49 cents per $100 assessed valuation.
The other two promises were to hire more staff and replace vehicles and upgrade equipment. Vollmar said the department has completed those promises, but it doesn’t make sense to keep the High Ridge office open.
“I just hope folks will understand that this decision was not made lightly,” she said. “Trying to serve the community on that side of the country better, we see the mobile units as a better access point.”
Diehl said when the board decided to open the High Ridge office, the Health Department did not have as many mobile units as it does now.
“We can use those to go wherever we want or need to go to provide the same services, probably on a more scheduled and more efficient basis,” he said. “We want to make sure people understand we’re not leaving that part of the county to their own devices.”
The Health Department plans to replace its Hillsboro office with a new, larger office building in the Pear Tree Plaza near the intersection of highways 21 and B in Hillsboro.
Vollmar said plans for the office are still being created by the Archimage architectural firm, but she hopes to see the new office open by February 2024 or March of 2024.