Traverse City Record-Eagle

Grand Traverse County

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    PLANNED PARENTHOOD CUTS
November 21, 2009

Reproductive health clinic to scale back

Changes could mean higher fees for patients' treatment

BY LINDSAY VANHULLE

TRAVERSE CITY -- A local reproductive health center is open fewer hours and could be forced to raise fees for some clients after the state's health department reduced its funding.

Planned Parenthood's Traverse City office now is closed Tuesdays and operates on a varied schedule the rest of the week as a result of more than $350,000 in cuts to the organization's West and Northern Michigan chapter.

The reduction represents about 31 percent of the chapter's budget for family planning, services that include birth control and annual exams, spokeswoman Julie McKeiver said.

Offices in Traverse City and Petoskey were affected, as were locations in Big Rapids and Ionia.

McKeiver said the changes took place at the start of the new fiscal year in October, after officials learned the Michigan Department of Community Health intended to cut funding. Official notice came this week.

"Unlike the state of Michigan, we need to have a balanced budget to start our year," McKeiver said. "We looked at client numbers and we determined that we would be able to serve at these four sites the same number of clients in a smaller time frame."

No staff were lost at the Traverse City office, but those retained had hours cut, center manager Karen Griggs said.

The state dollars support a program that allows some clients to pay for services based on income, on what's referred to as a sliding scale, said Griggs, who also works with the Petoskey and Marquette offices.

The cutbacks mean the offices have fewer funds to distribute, which will result in a smaller number of recipients, McKeiver said.

Patients who don't have insurance or Medicaid likely would have to pay more for the same services if funding for the sliding scale runs out before the end of the fiscal year in September.

"There's so much economic need right now," Griggs said. "The more we cut hours and the more we fall back, the harder it is to get patients in."

She said employees are asking clients to pay for services if they can afford to.

In addition, they are trying to enroll more women in a statewide income-based program, known as Plan First, that covers such services as office visits and birth control prescriptions.

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