After Ottawa County Administrator John Gibbs demanded the Department of Public Health cut its budget by 50 percent, the county’s top Health Officer fired back on social media.
In an open letter posted to Facebook, Ottawa County Health Officer Adeline Hambley called the request “ridiculous,” saying that Administrator John Gibbs had asked her on Tuesday to cut the department’s budget in half and propose the changes by Thursday.
“Proposed budget reductions of this size will significantly impair, and likely eliminate, various public health services and the health department’s ability to maintain public health and safety,” Hambley wrote.
Next door in Muskegon County, Public Health Officer Kathy Moore agreed.
“Public health’s role is to protect the population in general,” Moore said. “So, they will lose that capacity to monitor and manage communicable diseases as well as environmental concerns.”
The demand from Gibbs follows in the footsteps of Ottawa Board Chair Joe Moss, who at a work session earlier in the week had proposed cutting the health department’s budget from $6.4 million down to $2.5 million, arguing that is roughly the budget the department operated on from 2009-2019.
Meanwhile, Hambley wrote in her letter,
“If the commission moves forward with this level of budget-slashing, I believe it will be a clear act of unlawful retaliation against me.”
The board of commissioners had tried to terminate Hambley back in January, for what she argues was an act of political retaliation for the government ordered mandates put in place during the pandemic.
She has since filed a wrongful termination lawsuit and is still employed by the county.
