WIC programs in Vilas and Oneida counties to merge

The Oneida County public health board Monday unanimously approved a merger of the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) programs in Oneida and Vilas counties.

The approval followed a presentation by Oneida County public health director Linda Conlon, who said Vilas County officials, citing staffing issues in the county health department, had approached her with the merger proposal; Vilas County public health director Tami Boers and the department’s assistant director, Stephanie Van Natta, are both leaving their positions with Vilas County.

Van Natta, who along with Boers submitted her resignation from her county position on May 21, is also currently Vilas County’s WIC director. 

“They’re a pretty small health department as it is,” Conlon told the public health board Monday. “They approached us, they talked to their (public health) board and their board approved a merger between Oneida and Vilas counties.”

Conlon said a merger of this type is nothing new. 

“There are several mergers across the state,” she said, citing WIC program mergers of Marathon, Lincoln and Langlade counties as an example nearby. “It’s not an unusual thing.”

Conlon said members of Oneida County’s finance staff “ran the numbers” to see if it would be feasible for Oneida County. 

“The way we’re funded, there’s a set amount of dollars per client,” she said. “We had a meeting with (Vilas County health department staff) to see the frequency of their visits ... we looked at our staffing and everything else.”

Conlon said in reality, members of her staff had already been seeing some of the Vilas County WIC program’s clients “because they were having difficulty being seen in Vilas County.”

“Again, that’s nothing unusual,” she said. “People see a doctor in Oneida County, they shop in Oneida County, we vaccinate a lot of people. Although Oneida County is small, it’s still the hub of the Northwoods.”

Conlon said she and her staff believe a merger “would actually benefit Vilas County residents” by increasing access to WIC appointments and services. “Because we would have a full-time WIC clerk here,” she said.

“They’ll just have better access to WIC than they did in Vilas County just by virtue of the size,” she said. “It has nothing to do with or how well they did anything in Vilas County. It just has to do with the size and their ability to respond.”

Conlon reiterated financially, Oneida County “is in a good spot.”

“We’ve been working with the state as well to make sure we’re crossing our t’s and dotting our i’s and would ask of this of the board of health to make a motion to approve that (merger),” she said. “Normally, you know, I could write grants, we could write multi-level county grants without board of health approval but because it’s a merger ... happening in the middle of the year, it’s not a brand new grant, I would ask for board of health approval.”

Conlon said moving forward with the merger won’t negatively impact the integrity of the Oneida County WIC program. 

Board member Billy Fried asked if there was an agreement and fiscal impact for board members to review.

“Or are we just blindly thinking the merger has been looked at by corporation counsel?” he asked. 

Conlon said the state of Wisconsin doesn’t require an agreement to merge and that the Vilas County WIC contract “would get transferred to us.”

“We have a contract with the state right now for an X number of dollars and they’re just going to increase that contract,” she said. “That’s the agreement. What we’re going to do is work with Vilas County so they can have a few hours just so their front desk person can answer questions and refer to us.”

Conlon also said there wasn’t anything binding; if it’s found over time, the program isn’t working, both counties would be able to remove themselves from the WIC merger. 

Boers told The Lakeland Times with Van Natta’s departure, there would be no WIC representative in the Vilas County public health office for its WIC program. 

She said after Van Natta submitted her resignation, Suzanne Polacek with the state’s Department of Health Services was contacted “and the merger with Oneida came up.”

“We reached out to Linda and asked if we could meet in order for them to merge and take on our WIC clients,” Boers said. 

Brian Jopek may be reached via email at [email protected].