Neighborcare Health is still aiming to open the clinic at Sunrise Ridge by the middle or end of September, and a variety of preparations are underway to make that happen, from raising funds to hiring staff.

“There are a lot of moving pieces to get the clinic open to be fully operational for the people on Vashon,” Mary Schilder, Neighborcare’s director of marketing communications, said last week.

Among the pieces that have been nearly completed is a finalized lease, which Schilder said both parties have agreed on. Sunrise Ridge Health Services representatives, landlords of the site, have signed it, and Neighborcare’s CEO will sign it soon it as well.

Additionally, about three-fourths of the clinic support staff have been hired, Schilder said, and work is in process to get the appropriate technology in place, including computer and phone systems. Efforts are also underway to credential all the providers, a key step to enrolling them with contracted insurance plans, Schilder said. She noted it can take up to three months to complete this step, which verifies the providers’ experience, practice history, licensing and education, but Neighborcare Health is working to expedite the process. If it is completed soon, some of the providers may begin work in the interim period at a Neighborcare clinic in West Seattle, but it is not clear yet if and when that will happen, Schilder said.

Meanwhile, islander Rick Wallace is chairing the effort to raise funds to offset projected clinic losses, estimated to be $190,000 for each of the first two years. At Neighborcare Health, Chief Development Officer Joseph Sparacio said in a recent email that officials there based their projected losses on information they received about previous clinic usage and combined it with their model as a federally qualified health center, which receives higher reimbursements than other clinics for patients covered by Medicare and Medicaid. Sparacio added that Neighborcare Health is a financially stable organization, but as a non-profit community health center, it does not have the resources to support rapid, sudden expansion.

“That’s why support from the community — by contributing to fundraising and using clinic services — is critical to ensure long-term success. We look forward to being Vashon’s health care partner well into the future,” he wrote.

As previously reported, King County has provided $20,000 to this clinic transition, and state Sen. Sharon Nelson has requested state funds to help as well, though she has not received final word on that request yet. More will be known about their availability within a few weeks, she said.

The public kickoff of the island fundraising effort is expected in the next few weeks, Wallace said, but he noted that work is already underway on several fronts, including talking with potential major donors and creating a Save Our Clinic website, which came online last week and is linked to the Neighborcare website.

Wallace added that he also believes the two years of a funding shortfall will have benefits to the community beyond what raising money for one year would have.

“Two years will allow time for us to learn about each other. By making it (the fundraising effort) cover two years, it will give all of us time to have discussions about the future in an informed way. They need to learn about us, and we need to learn about them. This whole thing can be adjusted and tuned to the best services for the island and be sustainable so we do not have to go through this again.”

With Franciscan clinic closed for nearly four weeks, Vashon Island Fire & Rescue interim Assistant Chief of Operations Bob Larsen said while the department’s call volume is high, they have not noticed a significant increase in calls because of the clinic closure.

At Vashon Natural Medicine, owner Kelly Wright said providers there are working with Neighborcare and are happy to be providing care for additional Vashon residents during this time of transition. Staff at Fulton Family Medicine previously indicated that clinic could not take extra patients, but would create a waiting list of Medicare patients and see them as they could. An email inquiring how that process was going was not returned by press time.

Washington State Ferries (WSF), however, said since the clinic closed Aug. 5, they have noticed a definite increase in evacuations — when the ferry system changes its schedule by holding a ferry or calling one back to the island to provide an emergency transport — and medical priority loads, which include both ambulances and people in private vehicles headed to the hospital.

WSF spokesperson Broch Bender said in July, evacuations each week ranged from zero to three, and medical priority loads ranged from 13 to 15. However, from Aug. 1 to 28, those numbers ranged from one to four evacuations each week and from 18 to 21 medical priority loads.

Bender noted that if these numbers hold steady throughout the remainder of 2016, it would mean more than 800 evacuations/medical priority loads this year, nearly 70 more than in 2015, almost 200 more than in 2014 and nearly 400 more, or double, than in 2013. Islanders may have noticed the increase in medically related transportation because of its effects on the ferry schedule, she said, noting the trips’ importance.

“We go out of our way to accommodate priority loads and evacuations,” she added.

No opening date for the clinic has been set yet, but Schilder said Neighborcare Health will announce when the phone lines open for appointments — which will happen before the clinic opens. More information about Neighborcare Health and the current process is available online at neighborcare.org.