A fresh start in 2016 WEEKEND | 14 JANUARY 1, 2016 VOLUME 23, NO. 49
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Future of MV RotaCare thrown into limbo APPOINTMENTS CANCELED AS FREE HEALTH CARE CLINIC SCRAMBLES TO FILL STAFF SHORTAGE By Mark Noack
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ne of the area’s few options for free health care, Mountain View’s nonprofit RotaCare clinic at El Camino Hospital is dealing with a sudden crisis as it races to stave off possible closure. While several officials at El Camino insist that no decision on a permanent closure has been made, they say the clinic lacks staffing to continue operations and may need to redirect patients to other clinics and cancel schedules for volunteers. The news broke last week when hospital administrators emailed about 200 volunteers to tell them that, starting in January, their schedules were canceled. The message indicated that RotaCare’s future was in jeopardy, but it emphasized it was too early to “confirm an official closure.” The main reason behind RotaCare’s uncertainty, said hospital spokeswoman Chris Ernst, is that the clinic’s seven-person staff would soon be losing some mandatory members, including two nurse practitioners and their in-house physician. Until those key positions can be filled, the clinic is legally obligated to cease operations. “We have a full-court press going not to have any disruptions,” Ernst said. “It’s a complex situation, and we have several positions that we have to backfill. We can’t open the clinic without them.” The turnover at the clinic came at a particularly inconvenient time — during the holiday season — but hospital officials expressed confidence they could find replacements in the next two weeks. Hospital officials said
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they expected RotaCare to be able to see some existing patients on a limited basis over the course of January. “We’re assuming we’ll be able to get the right staffing at the right time,” Ernst said. “I can’t imagine we won’t be able to find the people we need in the next two weeks.” The Mountain View RotaCare served about 2,220 patients last year, but hospital administrators said the clinic was no longer filling the vital role it once did. The clinic’s staff has been seeing smaller demand, due in part to low-income residents being priced out of the area. In past years, free clinics such as RotaCare provided a crucial service as one of the few health care options for a large uninsured population, but in recent years this need has dwindled as more patients gained health coverage through the expansion of the Affordable Care Act and Medi-Cal. Nevertheless, the news that RotaCare was on the verge of closing came as a surprise to many. Joan Brodovsky, who volunteers by providing translation services, said she was “devastated” when she read the hospital’s initial email. She feared what a closure would mean for patients who rely on RotaCare’s services. “There were patients who had appointments that were three or four months out,” she said. It’s “terrible” to receive a 10-day notice saying the clinic might close, she said. Similarly distraught was Mountain View resident Guadalupe Garcia, 28, who has been coming to RotaCare for See ROTACARE, page 7
MICHELLE LE
MOUNTAIN VIEW’S YEAR IN PHOTOS In 2015, the economy picked up and the real estate market soared, but that wasn’t good news for the Mountain View residents being left behind. The dark side of gentrification — worsening traffic, soaring housing prices, displacement of longtime residents and independent businesses — all served to tap into a wellspring of frustration and anxiety. But the year wasn’t all gloom and doom in the city. Our top picks for the images of the year start on page 10.
Fewer students opt for continuation school SUPERINTENDENT: DROP IN ALTA VISTA ENROLLMENT IS SIGN OF SUCCESS FOR MVLA By Kevin Forestieri
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lta Vista High School is getting smaller, as enrollment at the continuation high school shrinks. But officials at the Mountain View-Los Altos High School District aren’t too worried, and say the declining enrollment is actually a positive sign. The continuation high school saw enrollment decline this year, in line with a four-year trend that is likely to continue into
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next year. The total number of students at the school is a little tricky to track, as enrollment changes throughout the school year, but on any given day the school has about 100 students on campus. By comparison, the school had over 130 students on campus in the 2011-12 school year. To Superintendent Jeff Harding, this is great news. Most students transfer to Alta Vista because they are low on class credits or have attendance or
behavioral problems. Statewide, about 7 to 10 percent of students are in alternative education programs like Alta Vista, Harding said. But the schools that feed into Alta Vista, including the district’s Mountain View and Los Altos high schools, as well as Palo Alto Unified’s Gunn and Palo Alto high schools, have done a good job at keeping students from falling through the cracks, he said. “With 8,000 high school students, we can’t even fill 120 seats. It’s really a testament to how we engage our students at the larger schools,” Harding. Dwindling numbers of students can spell trouble for schools that rely on steady enrollment for funding, but that won’t be a problem for See ALTA VISTA, page 6