Martha's Vineyard Community Services Press Room

Update on VNS Closing...

Date: Wednesday, April 16, 2008

As announced in March 2008, the Visiting Nurse Service of Martha's Vineyard Community Services will close on June 30th. Sharon Clauss-Zanger, the VNS program director, and her amazing team have been working closely with the management team of the Vineyard Nursing Association to insure that the transition will be as smooth as possible for patients.

As you might imagine, this has been a painful period for our staff. To ease the change, we have provided a generous severance package for all staff and are actively assisting them in finding other employment. A number of home health aides and nurses have accepted positions at VNA and will continue as caregivers for their patients as the transition is completed. Others are interviewing or have already accepted positions in other health care facilities on Island.

The difficult decision to close the Visiting Nurse Service, one of our oldest programs, was made as part of our long-range strategic planning process to ensure both clarity on future direction and a firm financial foundation for Community Services. We have no plans to close other programs and once this transition is completed, will focus our attention on unduplicated services related to prevention, education, advocacy, and treatment in the human services-mental health, substance abuse, disability services, domestic violence, and sexual assault, early childhood development, and community capacity building.

Thank you for continuing to support our work as we move forward.
After 20 Years, MV Challenge Returns to Port

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Martha's Vineyard Community Services
Jan Hatchard, Director of Development/Public Relations
508-693-7900 x 374

The sails have been lowered for the MV Challenge, a windsurfing race founded by U.S. Windsurfing Champion Nevin Sayre in 1988. Over the course of the event, which celebrated a very special 20th anniversary last year, windsurfers, sailors, and paddlers gathered for a weekend every September and ultimately raised more than $200,000 in support of Martha's Vineyard Community Services.

This was sailors giving back to our community. Every sailor challenged their own personal goal, and in most years some completed the arduous 55 mile circumnavigation of the island in support of MVCS. This was the longest windsurfing marathon in the world. Some years there were gale force winds and other years where the spectators had to blow from the beach to provide the breeze. Depending on the conditions, it sometimes took over ten hours to round the island. In 1996 Nevin made it around in the record 3hrs 17 minutes. (It is pointed out that not many power boats could beat that time.)

One of the great things about the Challenge was that it included an array of volunteers who otherwise might have little contact with MVCS. The list of volunteers who supported the event over several years is long, but special thanks must go to Sam Berlow, Sam Howell, Dan Weiss, Jack Ware, and Deanna Williamson. Then there is Keith Gross and his family who have been pillars of the event and who raised the most sponsorship for MVCS over the twenty-year history. It was recently agreed that the 20th year provided a great close for the event as we had experienced the most beautiful race day anyone could remember and many old friends gathered to participate in raising a record of nearly $16,000.

This has been more than an event for us at MVCS. This has been a reunion every year-watching young talented windsurfers grow up and then watching their children grow and join in the fun. We are grateful for the opportunity to know them and for the way they and their families have supported the work of MVCS to insure that we would be there to help other families. It's been a privilege to be part of it.

The Board and Staff of MVCS send a heartfelt thank you to Nevin Sayre and all who have participated, volunteered, and sponsored this amazing event over the past twenty years. We will miss you!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Martha's Vineyard Community Services
Jan Hatchard, Director of Development/Public Relations
508-693-7900 x 374

Bringing to an end an important era of service to the community of Martha's Vineyard, the Board of Directors of Martha's Vineyard Community Services has made the decision to close the agency's Visiting Nurse Service as of June 30, 2008 provided that adequate and appropriate transition arrangements have been made for our clients.

Established in October of 1965, the Visiting Nurse-Homemaker Service was created in response to a concern that Islanders were being deprived of the important resource of home health care so common in other American communities. In 1984, after a disagreement between the MVCS Board and the then VNS Advisory Committee, a second home health care agency was opened. By the early 2000s, the health care climate had changed enough so that many of the VNS nursing services were no longer fully reimbursed. At the same time, community pressure has grown to find a way to solve the issues raised by the existence of two home health care services on an island the size of Martha's Vineyard. There has been a costly duplication of service and not a small amount of confusion for the public. The Board of MVCS feels that patients would best be served by one home health care service tending to the needs of the Island without the competition that has drained energy from both organizations over the years.

Over the past several years, Board Chair Susan Wasserman led an effort to explore a merger with Vineyard Nursing Association which was unfortunately unsuccessful. In her words, "Trying to merge a single focus organization into our multi-service organization proved too complicated to succeed as a merger. All of us on the Board and management team at MVCS continued to grapple with the duplication and eventually came to the realization that we needed to make the difficult decision to close our own Visiting Nurse Service.

Susan Wasserman shares, "Over our long history, community members have welcomed us into island homes for happy events and under very sad circumstances. This historic bond has been a source of pride and strength for the agency making this decision tremendously difficult. VNS has a wonderfully talented and committed staff - some of the finest people you could have the good fortune to know or employ. They are like family to us. Making a business decision that has impacted these human beings who are our friends and our deeply admired coworkers, has been the hardest decision I've made in my tenure as Board president."

In approaching the closing of VNS, MVCS is fully committed to working with every VNS employee to provide support and assistance to help them through this transition. As always, the well-being of patients is of primary concern. VNS Program Director Sharon Clauss-Zanger wants patients to be reassured. She comments, "As the agency moves toward the closing of VNS at the end of June, we will work closely with our patients to insure that the transfer of care is as seamless as possible."

Executive Director Julia Burgess notes, "Community Services has historically established new programs and closed programs in response to community needs and now we've made a difficult decision to close our Visiting Nurse Service. MVCS is above all a human service organization and the need for human development, mental and behavioral health services, and support for people with disabilities has never been greater on Martha's Vineyard."

"This decision has been made as part of our long-range strategic planning process and was not related to financial difficulties within the agency. We are not facing additional program closings. We ultimately came to a point where before investing substantial additional resources in hiring, construction and technology upgrades, a decision needed to be made."

"Once this transition is completed, the agency will use energy and resources to strengthen the human services that have formed a safety net of support for the Island community for forty-seven years. When we are assured that the health care needs of our existing clients are being fully met, we will renew our focus on the growth of prevention, education, advocacy, treatment, and human development services in order to keep pace with the current and emerging needs of the Island community."