Health Dept. to Lay Off 53 Employees, Reduce Programs

The Will County Health Department will be laying off 53 full-time employees, which will also result in a reduction of programs within the department.

The layoffs and program reductions are in response to the state’s budget stalemate. Without money from the state, the department was forced to take action, according to Health Department spokesman Vic Reato. The department is currently owed $2.121 million dollars.

Reato said the layoffs will be effective May 27 and include five managers and 48 full-time union employees.

The department has notified AFSCME Local 1028 of the layoffs, as required by the terms of the contract with the union, according to Reato.

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Four programs in the department’s family health services are being reduced, which include vision and hearing, HIV prevention, tobacco control and family case management. In the behavioral health division, adult services, capitated care, crisis response program, juvenile justice and psych medications will be reduced. However, there’s no one from psych medications that will be laid off. The department will simply stop providing the medication.

The adult psychiatric services program, a subsection of the adult services program, will be eliminated.

Reato said the layoffs and program reductions will help reduce about $2 million dollars in costs, but will still leave around $120,000 that needs to be addressed.

“We are looking at additional ways that we might be able to mitigate that total,” Reato said.

In addition to the layoffs, 13 positions with the department have been frozen.

“Those are essentially positions that are unfilled or are positions where the individuals in them are going to retire,” Reato said. “They’re just having a hiring freeze for those positions.”

Reato wants people to understand that the layoffs and reductions were not brought on by anything other than the budget impasse.

“It doesn’t have anything to do with fiscal mismanagement or the employees themselves,” Reato said. “This is strictly the result of the state not paying its bill. These are grant-funded programs. Grants that come from the state of Illinois and they are simply not paying those grants because of their budget impasse. Without that revenue, we can’t possibly operate the programs at the same level.”

However, once the budget is passed and the health department receives the money it’s owed, Reato said the goal is to bring back the programs and staff needed to run them.

“If and when the revenue shortfall is mitigated by the state, the individuals who were laid off can be brought back,” Reato said.