Cass County has vaccines for students, trouble with death certificates, trouble hiring dispatchers and trouble getting bids for vehicles
Apr. 5—For students 16 and older who have parental permission to get one of the COVID-19 vaccines, the Cass County Health Department will be having a vaccination clinic at the Berry Bowl at Logansport High School on April 16.
Health Department Administrator Serenity Alter told the Cass County Commissioners that she expects about 1,500 kids at the event.
Other schools will bus students in, but they have to be invited.
In addition to Cass County school districts, the health department has invited Carroll County schools.
The county's vaccine distribution remains constant and hasn't come close to running short of vaccines.
"It's gone very well," Alter said.
The Berry Bowl event will start at 7 a.m. with teachers and staff receiving the vaccinations then and last until about 2 -3 p.m., she said.
Students 18 and older will receive the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, which is effective in one shot.
Other students will receive Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine and return for its second dose May 17.
Alter stated that older students will get the one-injection vaccine because of impending graduation and going on to other situations.
Otherwise, Cass will continue to use the Johnson & Johnson vaccine for shut-ins that health care workers visit to vaccinate and for other people that are in situations where one shot would be more practical.
Also at the meeting, Cass County Coroner George Franklin told the commissioners that the upswing in "assist other agencies" incidents had to do with cremations and the continued problems getting death certificates under the new system Indiana instituted at the start of the year.
Cremations require a death certificate, and if a county health department can't issue one, funeral directors may temporarily use county coroners to sign off on death certificates and allow cremations.
It was on Jan. 4 that the Indiana State Health Department [ISHD], switched from the Indiana Death Registry System [IDRS] to Database Registration of Indiana's Vital Events [DRIVE], built and hosted by VitalChek.
Franklin said he received an email from the state saying that now only 19 percent of deaths aren't able to be approved.
That number was at 40 percent at the start of the new system.
Birth certificates are also held up under the system, and that's at 8 percent now, Franklin said.
In other meeting business, E911 Director Amber Offutt said that her department again needs to hire two more dispatchers because of turnover.
Two recent trainees are moving up into vacated positions.
The staff should be at 12 full-time employees but the last time it had that many employees was "a couple years ago," Offutt said.
In answer to questions from the Commissioners President Ryan Browning (R, District 3), Offutt said it's hard to fill the positions.
Cass does pay less than surrounding counties for the same position and it takes 10 to 12 weeks to become fully trained, she said.
Browning noted the pay problem continues even after a recent raise for the position.
The open positions start at $27,719 a year, said Offutt.
The requirements for the job are simply not having a criminal record and having "a good work ethic," she said.
The position doesn't even require an employee to live in the county.
Although the commissioners haven't approved hiring for the two open positions yet, Offutt said that her department is accepting resumes and applications.
"They can send them in right now, today. We're always looking," she said.
Also at the meeting, the commissioners accepted three bids for review on a truck for the Cass County Highway Department, one bid for the chassis and two for the other requirements.
The commissioners said that usually, they get five to even bids, but bids aren't coming in the wake of the COVID-19 distancing requirements.
Browning said it's hard to order even civilian trucks these days.
Reach James D. Wolf Jr. at james.wolf@pharostribune.com or 574-732-5117
Twitter @JamesDWolfJr
