HCHC accepts bid for Park Place roofing project

BY BRYCE KELLY

Mt. Pleasant News

Despite a disappointing turnout for bidding on Henry County Health Center?s (HCHC) Park Place roof replacement, the HCHC Board of Trustees did approve Robison Construction, based in Cedar Rapids, for the project.

With only Robison Construction?s bid to choose from, Mike Dean, of Invision Architecture, the lead architect on the project, did his due diligence to vet Robison and make his recommendation that the board accept the bid of $93,390.80 for the roof replacement.

?The bid price is very reasonable, so that is not a concern for us,? said Dean. ?They did not include a performance and payment bond with the bid, but that is something that they said they could get to us ASAP.?

Despite the disappointing turnout for bids, Dean reassured the board that Robison?s bid was very competitive, and could result in a roughly $50,000 savings to the health center, should the project be completed without any major issues.

Before signing contracts, however, HCHC CEO Robb Gardner told the board that he would like to review references for Robinson, as well as secure a performance and payment bond before moving forward. Dean agreed to promptly procure said items for the health center.

Moving on to other matters, the board had overall positive results to review from associate engagement surveys and provider satisfaction surveys. First to be addressed was the associate engagement survey, which according to Gardner, was a 61-question survey and had an 82 percent response rate.

?The industry standard is a 67 percent response rate from this survey, so we were happy to see our associates reaching out and letting their voices be heard,? said Gardner. ?And our overall rating was better than the industry average.?

Within the associate engagement survey, 49 percent of HCHC associates would ?definitely recommend? HCHC as a place to work. No associates chose ?definitely no? when asked the same question. Roughly 90 percent of associates rated the health center in the top percentile when asked to rate its patient-centered care practices.

As to the provider satisfaction surveys, overall positive results were also there despite nationwide burnout rates for healthcare providers being at an all-time high, according to Gardner. And while the overall benchmark for this survey is still low, Gardner told the board that as this newer survey continues to gain ground in other critical access hospitals, it will become more and more useful to track quality within the healthcare industry.

?Overall, we remained pretty consistent to last year when we took this survey,? he said. ?No major dips or jumps were seen.?

Before moving into closed session to discuss strategic proprietary information, Gardner reviewed operational goals for fiscal year 2017, which included improving service, improving outpatient care satisfaction results, decreasing patient fall rate and improving community involvement ?among others.

The board also reviewed the 2016 fiscal year audit report.

The next HCHC Board of Trustees meeting will be held on Tuesday, Oct. 18, at noon, in the HCHC Board Room.