Town Talk Church Point
Town Talk Church Point
A Conversation with Mayor Spanky and Michael LeJeune, CEO of Acadia St Landry Hospital
Ever wonder how rural healthcare operates ? How about the role hospitals play in local economic growth? In today's episode we chat with Mayor Spanky and Michael LeJeune, CEO of Acadia St Landry Hospital, and gain a deep insight into these questions. Michael’s strategic focus on personnel optimization, expense control, and the importance of the hospital as a job creator and essential healthcare provider unfolds during our conversation. Alongside this, we address the hospital's economic impact on the local town of Church Point.
We also take a closer look at the challenges faced while providing healthcare services in rural regions of the country. Our engaging conversation with Michael examines Acadia St Landry Hospital's strategies to overcome these hurdles, including successful negotiations with two of the area's top insurance companies and their ongoing efforts to inform the community about available services. Plus, you won't want to miss the possibility of bringing in specialists based on community feedback - a major stride towards advancement!
Lastly, join us as we explore the exciting plans for a new hospital south of Church Point. We discuss the impending advantages of the new location, the age of the existing hospital and its code compliance, and the need for an influx of new services. Together, we navigate the complex process and financial aspects of building such a facility, and how organizations like the USDA can be pivotal in this journey. We round off our chat with a heartening reflection on the remarkable progress in Church Point and the tireless efforts of Mayor Spanky and Michael LeJeune. So, tune in for an enlightening discussion on the intricacies of rural healthcare and community development. Let’s talk health, economics, and the power of community!
It is another episode of the Town Talk podcast. Again got a special guest with us. Obviously we have Mayor Spanky here. He's on pretty much every podcast that we have. And then we have the CEO of Acadia St Landry Hospital, michael LeChern. Thanks for joining us. Absolutely, we have a lot to talk about. I know you just made one year at the hospital. I can't believe it's been a year yet. How about getting us an update to start on what's happened in your first year at ASLH?
Speaker 3:Yeah, sure You're right. It is shocking to believe that it's already been a year July 25th that I've been at the hospital. Quite the challenging year we're going. To be honest, we had a lot of obstacles to overcome. I think we did quite a great job with overcoming quite a few of those obstacles.
Speaker 3:In the first year, I think our main focus really was going to be on getting the right people in the right positions so that way we can move the hospital forward, and I think we've done a pretty good job with that. We've hired some key individuals to fill those roles. The second part was really to look at the expenses that the hospital had, the contracts, what we were paying for, so what was going out of the hospital and how could we control those expenses. The first year we've done a lot in that way of making sure that we know what we're paying. If we're sending out a check, we know what we're paying. We know what the hospital is getting in return. So we put a whole lot of work in the first year on again getting the right people in the right position and controlling the expenses of the hospital.
Speaker 1:So that was really your main focus of getting the money right, basically in controlling that Mayor. Anything you want to add on the first year.
Speaker 2:Or time flies when you're having fun, that's right. Yeah, how did that last? I mean, like I said, I've met with Michael before it took over. I mean hand in hand. Every time I've called he's listening, every time he's called. We're working together to try to get this thing going, because the hospital is very, very important at Church Point. It's a major job getter, it's people in town work there. That's what we need and I mean we really need to accept that and start supporting our hospital, because they have all the services we need to get us through. But a lot of people don't know all those services. That's right.
Speaker 3:And that's a big thing, mayor, that you're saying is we do have all the services. We'll have individuals come in who maybe haven't been in the hospital in years, and that has been a real feather in the cap is we're bringing a lot more people back to the hospital in this first year that hadn't been in a very long time. You know, when they come in like, well, we didn't know y'all could do labs here. We didn't know you could do X-rays, cts. We didn't know you can do the respiratory test all here and we can, right here in Church Point. And, like you said, the hospital is truly important to those individuals in this town.
Speaker 3:We have an elderly community in Church Point. To get out of town is difficult, to get to all these different appointments is very difficult, and if we didn't have the hospital, I think a lot of people would forego proper care. I don't think that they would be able to make the trip to all these other different facilities, although not that far down the road, but far enough. Right, I think having the hospital is huge for this town. It really is, and it's something that the people need, not only for health care but also jobs. I'd say it's pretty high up on the list of hires and employees. The most people from the town of Church Point.
Speaker 1:Do you feel that maybe not as many people from town utilize the hospital as you would like? Like you would like to see more residents taking advantages of the services that are at the hospital.
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely yeah, I think we could fulfill the needs of the individual. Sure, there are a lot of specialties now, specialties in medicine and in medication that people have to go out of town for, but the basic needs, your emergency services, all your diagnostics, we can do that right here in town for the individuals here.
Speaker 2:And I'm guilty. I mean, let's be honest and look when you don't know and you don't ask. That's what happens. I was getting blood tests every year and I just would go wherever you tell me to go is where I go and one day I called Michael. I said do y'all do that? Well yeah, just go into the emergency room and get it done, and I did it. It's in our backyard. It took me literally three minutes.
Speaker 1:It was wonderful.
Speaker 2:So you're traffic to go to life and get just to do some blood work, exactly, and I mean, like I said, for a person like me, I mean you're going to laugh, yet that's going to be an hour. You're going to go somewhere. I said while you're there, you're going to go look at some other things. The price a lot more money.
Speaker 2:Then I'd rather just save my money going out backyard and get it done right there, but I'm even guilty of that, Like I've been living almost my whole life and I didn't know something as basic as that. But we know now. So that's where we're going to go.
Speaker 3:So you bring up a good point about when people go out of town. They'll go look at something else. Not only is it an economic driver in health care, but it's just an economic driver overall for the town of Church Point. So, for example, if you have an individual in town who says you know what, I have to go to another town and I'm going to run some tests there, Well, they go there Once they run their tests, what are they going to do?
Speaker 2:Grow a stop. Well, I've got to do a few, I've got to pick a few groceries.
Speaker 3:I'm going to fill up my vehicle while I'm here. That's all revenue not coming into the town of Church Point. So anytime they go out to these other cities or these other medical facilities they're going to be spending money that is no longer benefiting the town of Church Point. So if we can keep our individuals in our own town and spend our money in here, that's a better economic driver for the town of Church Point.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and that's what I'm preaching is. That's why I say what I said, because when you go out of town, then while I'm there Let me go here and guess what? Go there If you're from Branch and you come to Church Point Hospital while I'm there. That's exactly the same thing, so we always you know.
Speaker 1:So, michael, you told us some of the things that you dealt with in year one. Obviously, you're coming up on year two. What's going to be the focus in your second year at Acadia, st Landry Hospital?
Speaker 3:We have some, in my opinion, some big things that we're gonna focus on. Year one was controlling expenses, because you can bring in as much revenue as you want, but if you're not controlling the expenses, you're just on a spinning wheel. So now that we have our expenses where we want them to be, we really wanna look at increasing the revenue for the hospital. Obviously, we can do that in multiple ways increasing the census, that's, getting the individuals from town to start utilizing the hospital again. You know, one of the things I hear from people is you don't accept our insurance. There are two big insurances in town that everyone has not everyone, but a lot of people have in the way of the Medicare Advantage plans, one being Humana MA plan and the other one being UnitedHealthcare Medicare Advantage plan. We are at the mercy of those two insurance companies. On when it is we're able to accept them. Since I've started here, after a couple of months we were heavy pushing on both of them because so many people have those insurances. We have talked nonstop with both insurance company and they really weren't that interested in giving us a contract for us to be able to start accepting those insurances. But you're gonna have a hard time getting me to go away if I think it's for the good of the community and the good of the hospital that I'm working at. So we continue to push. Fortunately, within the past couple of weeks, both of them UnitedHealthcare and Humana MA plans have agreed to give us a contract so that way we can start accepting those insurances. So now we're just waiting on how long that's gonna take and again we're at their mercy. But it's not that we're not trying. I have a feeling when they see my email come across there, you know their computer is like oh, this guy again. But I'm very dedicated to being able to have those insurances because that's what the people in our community have. So why would we not accept that insurance? So we're working very hard on being able to get those. We get more people in. We increase that revenue for the hospital.
Speaker 3:Another big factor we're working on we just hired a director of growth and strategy. Her main job is going to be exactly that letting people in the community know what services we have. What can the hospital do for you? We receive taxes. As a hospital. We owe it to the community to get out into the community. So we'll start attending things that the community's having making a presence, letting the community know that you support us. We certainly support you as well, having a better presence.
Speaker 3:Another big one that we're working on that is very difficult to do in rural America, if you will, rural critical access hospital is the recruiting of new physicians. I have been in talks with a couple of physicians who are actually very interested in the town of Church Point to provide family medicine. That's a very long process but we are working with those physicians to see how do we get you on board and how do you come to Church Point and provide that care. Another avenue we're looking at is bringing specialists to our hospital. We have office space within the hospital, on the outside of the hospital to be able to maybe bring in cardiology, pulmonology, ortho urology, those types of specialties that you're having to go out of town. So we're talking with some of those specialists to see what would it take to get you to come to our town and provide those services, even if it's maybe once a week, so to bring in. So again, that keeps our people in our own town and they're not having to travel so far to seek those specialties.
Speaker 2:And one thing that I wanted to ask, and maybe ask the public too, they really need if you have a question, call the hospital because, like an MRI I didn't know that they offered MRIs In church point how would we get those services that maybe we don't know that's happening, like maybe an MRI or any other services that we might be able to get on a one day, a week thing or something like that? How do you go about looking into that?
Speaker 3:The easiest answer is that is us knowing you need that service right. So if there are services that you need that we don't offer, call us and say, look, I need an MRI. The more calls we get requesting certain services, that's how we're able to get these specialties in the hospital right, because they're not gonna come out for one. No, no, they're not gonna come out for one.
Speaker 2:There's a certain amount that has to be appointed to make money. I mean it's at the end of the day, that truck that's coming has to make money.
Speaker 3:That's right we have to pay them to come out.
Speaker 2:Exactly so. If there's a demand and you're calling and saying, do you offer this, do you offer this, do you offer this, Well then there's a demand, that's right yeah, everything in health here is gonna be 100% based on the demand for it.
Speaker 3:We're no different than any other business owner, but expenses in healthcare are exactly that they are very expensive. So to try to bring on any type of specialty, we need to know that the community will in fact support that specialty coming. We don't wanna certainly we don't wanna waste anyone's time, especially physician coming, and there'd be no patients for that individual to see. So it is basically the economic supply and demand on how that works, and the only way we know that you need that is by you letting us know, right, you calling and saying do you offer these services? These are what we're looking for. We've talked to our friends in town. There's X amount of us that would really need a cardiologist around here. That's how we are able to put those numbers together and be able to bring those specialists into town.
Speaker 2:That's right. That's kind of what I wanted to see, you know.
Speaker 1:So we have another question and I'm gonna call it, for better lack of terms, the elephant in the room. Mayor, you wanna?
Speaker 2:Here we go. Discuss New hospital yes, anything like that. Coming to church for an um-four, sure, that's the entrance to town. That's gonna be a big driver. More jobs, more people coming to town to use those services and again, more gas groceries. And I hate to keep going back to that, but that's what.
Speaker 1:I say it's a part of it.
Speaker 2:No, you're right you know it's a big domino effect and, like I said, the hospital has done us very well for a long time. But where are we on that? Because I hear that all the time.
Speaker 3:Sure, Well, you and me both, we definitely hear it all the time. So where are we at on the new hospital? So let's kinda rewind just a little bit on where we were versus where we're at and where we're going. Before I got here, there were plans, there were quite a few plans, for a hospital to be built on the new property south of town, coming right in. It's a fantastic location, right. If we're gonna be honest, it's a fantastic location.
Speaker 3:I'm a paramedic and registered nurse by trade. I also have the business aspect behind and the first thing in business you learn is location, location, location. Right. In my opinion, the new property is a fantastic area to put a new hospital. It's gonna be the first thing you see coming into town, the last thing you see going out of town. Right there on the main highway, our current hospital, guys, it's old. You just have to walk through it to see that it's old and you know in hospitals built that long ago have certain things in them that you shouldn't have in building codes anymore, right, a Cadence-Alanter hospital as it stands now is out of code. Right, it's completely out of code. It's been grandfathered in about as much as you can possibly be grandfathered in.
Speaker 3:So I don't think the question is do we need a hospital or not? I think that question has been answered. We certainly do need a new hospital. You really just have to walk through it. The hot topic is is do we rebuild where we currently are or add on and fix it, if you will or do we move to the current location? I personally and I said this at our board meeting, which I will let you know is open to the public, so any of you are always welcome to join our hospital board meetings. I said this two months ago I think it's in the best interest of the hospital to build a reasonable-sized hospital on the new property. Where we're at now, we're landlocked. We're landlocked where we're at. If you put all the staff there now, the parking lot's full. You fill up the hospital with patients. People are parking on the side of the road. They're parking in the back of the hospital.
Speaker 3:When I was hired here, the board asked me or they did not ask me just come here and make the hospital survive. That's not what I was told it was. We want our hospital to thrive. Right, in order for our hospital to thrive, we have to bring in new services. We have to bring in additional service lines. I don't know, with the property where we currently are at that we'd be able to expand enough to be able to bring those types of services.
Speaker 3:There's a very interesting component of our hospital is that we're grandfathered in critical access hospital. We're not going to go into that in this podcast because it's a very lengthy explanation of what all these things mean. However, our current hospital cannot close. If it closes at any point in time, we risk losing that grandfathered in critical access status. I don't know if we were to lose that, if our hospital could sustain itself without that critical access status, I don't know how it would truly be possible to renovate the current building we're in, not to mention, it would have to be renovated from the ground up. From the ground up. The entire building for a hospital is out of compliance at this point. So I know that's the hot topic on.
Speaker 3:You know, are we moving forward? What are we doing? If you're asking me, I'm still meeting with the individuals for the USDA loan multiple times a month. I still meet with the architects multiple times a month. What I am trying to do right now is look at the old plans we had. How do we bring those plans down right, not make such a large, complex, but still provide all the services that we need in town, plus more services, additional services and a little bit of room to grow right. So that's what myself and the architects are currently working on we have to be able to bring the size of that hospital down to make it affordable okay.
Speaker 3:One of the issues we're running into is, since the first plans were made versus now, building costs have increased significantly.
Speaker 1:That was going to be one of my questions.
Speaker 3:The building costs essentially have doubled at this point. So even if I were to take 50% of that hospital, narrow it down to 50% of what it was, it's going to cost roughly the same amount. Okay, that's a hard pill to swallow. That's a hard pill to swallow, but the town needs the hospital. In my most humble opinion, the town needs the hospital.
Speaker 2:And with that I'm going to jump in right here. A lot of people hear that number, that millions upper millions not one or two and it's a shock, it's a sticker shock.
Speaker 2:They don't understand it. How can we build something that expensive in church point? We've never seen that before. That's because you've never seen it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. I'm not qualified to understand $50 million. I'm not. I mean, let's just be honest, I don't think any of us in this room are, but there's people that are at USDA. I deal with them on a town level. They deal with big numbers. There's all these organizations that you're working with to get this funding done. They know how to do that. See, pretty much anybody in church point is not in that demographic. I guess. Am I landing my plane on what we're talking about? Like it is shocking to see?
Speaker 1:wow, to see that come to town We've never. Probably next to the wholesale. Yeah that's right that massive of a operation. That's right. Yeah this would be the another thing newer that we've never seen before. That's right, and there's some people that embrace it, and maybe some people like I'm in I'm not sure how can we do a $50 million Facility in town? Is that exactly what?
Speaker 2:I'm saying that we don't understand from a public standpoint, like, if you don't understand it, then I must be against it and that's something we got to get away from sure. Because, like I said, it's not gonna be me up there saying, yeah, I think we could afford this, I, it's not gonna be anyone from over here that's gonna say we can afford this. It's gonna be a USDA representative that's giving the loan, the bankers. Sure, those are the people we need to be listening to, not me or Anybody. You know the coffee clubs in town. I'm not bashing you, I understand, but there is people that's trained to do understand, because there's hospitals in a lot of town.
Speaker 3:And a lot of critical access hospitals in the state of Louisiana currently being built. That's right, so that it's not like we're being the first. Exactly to be honest, we're one of the last, yeah, you know, in the way of critical access to either completely remodel from the ground up or build new. Yeah, we're one of the last in the state and that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:If you don't understand, we understand, sure, but we they have people that do understand it, yeah, and they're not gonna give money to a place and just say, well, if you make it, good, if you don't Process when you're more than 50 million dollars.
Speaker 3:You can pay back that they're not just gonna give you money and say we hope for the best right yeah correct.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's a lot involved. We turn over financials, we turn over a ton of information that these individuals asked for, even before we can begin that process again. And yes, I know people listen to this, are gonna say that was already done. It may have been, but we're not there anymore. We have to move forward, right, we have to move forward with what we had where we're at and with what we have. So it is the big question in town what's the CEO think about the new hospital? Why has he not moved faster? I have a great business mentor. You know. One thing he's told me that it's stuck with me is is you can do it right or you can do it fast.
Speaker 2:But you can do both.
Speaker 3:So we're under a microscope here. Yeah, with this hospital, there's a lot of people watching what this hospital is doing and not just in church, point guys, I'm talking statewide. You know there's a lot of people seeing what's our next move, what are we going to do? And you know, within this year We've put our little hospital back on the map. You know I get called some bigger hospitals asking what are you guys doing? What's the plan? How are we moving forward with this?
Speaker 3:So our little Acadia St Landry Hospital while we call it little is making an impact, making it. Yeah, people are starting to notice it, that we're making moves. I understand, maybe not as fast as someone, but we are making moves forward. But what everyone needs to know is myself as the CEO and staff of Acadia St Landry Hospital. All we are in this process is the catalyst right. We get all the information, we package it real nicely and then we present it to those who actually make the decision right.
Speaker 3:There's a lot of votes, there's a lot of consulting and, to be honest, there's a lot of politics involved in this right.
Speaker 3:But at the end of the day, all I can do is package all the information and it presented to those who actually make the decisions, you know. But that is what I intend to do. I intend to increase our revenue so that, with the USDA can say, look, these guys are doing something at this hospital. They can certainly afford to do these things, along with all the different critical access billing that allows us to be able to Build this hospital, and at that point they can say, yes, we're gonna approve this. No, we're not gonna approve this. At every different level, there are multiple different approvals. That has to has to happen once we give all of this information. So that is what I'm doing, as the CEO of this hospital is trying to really Increase our revenue, so that way, our finances look fantastic, because you know, the better your finances look, the better chance you have of getting these loans and pushing that forward to the decision makers and then them allowing us to build a new hospital in the future.
Speaker 1:That is the goal you brought up earlier, getting new physicians in New services. Do you feel having a new facility would be an advantage to you bringing in new services, getting new physicians, nurses, I mean? I feel it would almost be a place where others, or maybe new doctors, new people in the industry, would want to come work. Am I, am I thinking along the right?
Speaker 3:line spot on. I, you know I come. I have a lot of medical Individuals in my family, if you will, and we have this conversation. Yeah, seemingly almost every family gets together. We, you know the new hospital comes right. And you're exactly right. I hate to use that. If you build that, they will come right, but it's true. It is true. You know, I've spoken with physicians, I've spoken with specialty groups and All in one way or another. What they tell me is this in Michael, your hospital is so outdated. The minimum that we can do is too much for what you have. Right, that's a hard pill. Because I'm a nurse, I want to bring these specialties, I want to be able to take care of the individuals in our town, in the surrounding area. And whenever you talk to a specialty group and they're like we would love to come, we would sign up today, but your hospital is antiquated and we can't do what we need to do there.
Speaker 1:You said something else in the surrounding area. Obviously you do want to serve the residents of church point.
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely.
Speaker 1:You know, but you brought up the surrounding area. That is also another advantage too, because there's a lot of people on the outskirts of church. Point that I feel would would maybe make a decision to come to the new hospital instead of having to go elsewhere, maybe make the drive sit in traffic, and I think that would be an advantage to us having more services, a new facility. You're getting more people to come to town, absolutely.
Speaker 2:And there's a North I have to study. In my desk there's a Southeastern university did a study on church point and within five square miles we had we go from 4,100 people in church point to close to 13,000. I mean, that's a big jump.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that's just talking. You know, branch Lewis Berg, a little bit of mirror.
Speaker 3:You understand what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:I mean we have a lot of people in our area and we're the center of a lot of places and I mean I've had people tell me personally that they will leave an ER in Apalooza or Lafayette because there's a six or eight hour wait. That's right and they could come to church point and be seen. I mean I went to the day. I was seen within a minute.
Speaker 3:Pretty much walk right in, that's right. I wait times a very minimal.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I mean, that's something that's a big deal yeah.
Speaker 3:That's right. So you know rural hospitals are huge. You know they're huge to the state, they're huge, and you know, nationwide. What I like about the rural hospitals is we're big enough to provide the care that's necessary, but we're still small enough to be able to provide that personal touch. You know, and there are not many hospitals you can go to, where, when you come in, the nurse taking care of you already knows your name.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they already know all your family, because they likely go to church with you or they met you at rods or you know you're related, you know whatever it may be. So that's the fantastic thing about small, rural critical access hospitals is if you have a facility that can provide the services, like what I'm talking about with potentially building the new facility, then we can provide the care you need with that personal hometown touch which you don't get everywhere. You know you don't get everywhere. Yeah.
Speaker 2:One thing I would like to say to the community is be patient when I say that this building is a is a huge deal. It's going to take a long time. It will when you're going to hear oh, we're going to build a hospital, you're still years from entering that hospital.
Speaker 3:And.
Speaker 2:I'm, you know, I'm not talking 10 to 20.
Speaker 3:I'm talking but it's a building that you have a lot of crosses to T eyes to dot.
Speaker 2:You have a lot of paperwork is the same like grants in town you get the grant three years later You're doing the work and this work. Three years later there's still two years worth of work. That's right. And I'm not saying that this is not Spanky, saying five years. No, I'm saying that when you see something in the paper saying it's approved, it's a go. Do not expect dirt to be turning in a week. That's right. It's just part of it. It's a long process. It's going to be worth it and that's just what I'm asking is a little patience, because there's a lot of things that have to happen to get this to happen.
Speaker 3:You know, and I'll say this I say it at each of our board meetings, but I'll certainly say it here as well, in my position, I'm a public servant to church, point right. So there's nothing that I do for the hospital that's personal, in my own self interest. Everything I do is for the individuals to use our hospital, which means I have a very open door policy. So if any of you have any questions about, you know what are we doing, where we had on the process, why is this not happened? By all means, please call. I like to talk. I much prefer the in person conversations. You know, just just give us a call. It's easier if you schedule. And then, you know, let you and I sit down and let me answer your questions. You know, let me feel the questions that you have. You know, I said this when I first got here. If you don't know, it's because you didn't ask. Not much prefer you to have the most accurate information and ask me versus. Well, you know so and so said this. Who heard?
Speaker 3:it from this person who said that you know, it's kind of what the telephone game, right?
Speaker 1:We talk about that a lot on these podcasts. Yes, one thing before we wrap up obviously, if a new facility gets built, we will have the facility where the current hospital is Now. We know the new facility is a big process, right? Obviously, the question of what's going to happen to the old facility is probably not answered yet, correct.
Speaker 3:That's right. So if we build a new hospital on the new property, the last thing we're going to do is leave a large, empty abandoned building in the middle of town. Thank you, what?
Speaker 2:we do with that building hasn't been determined.
Speaker 3:We're a ways away from that. But, what I can tell you is speaking with other CEOs who have gone through this process. Leaving abandoned hospital is not the answer, so I do know that for sure. We will not just leave a large abandoned building in the middle of town. What we do with that hasn't been determined at this point.
Speaker 2:Okay, Well and like I said that's something that. I get you know from the people living in the neighborhood right around it.
Speaker 3:And.
Speaker 2:I mean it's understandable, and that's why we're asking these questions today, to maybe settle that, that fire in the stomach. You know that. Okay, well, at least they're talking about we are, you know.
Speaker 1:One thing I noticed, michael. You know living here in town, spanky can probably attest to this, I think. Even though there's a lot of talk about the new hospital facility, all that stuff, I think there's a lot of positivity at the hospital right now. Is that right?
Speaker 3:I would certainly agree with that. When I first took the role, it was a, you know, it was a little hit or miss on support of the current hospital, you know. But I would say, within this year, the positive support that we have from the community has been outstanding. I mean, if there was one thing or a couple things I would ask is, of course, like Mayor said, just please be patient with us. We are working through this process. I work on this seemingly every day to see how do we move forward, because the people in the town deserve it right. They deserve to have this hospital, in my opinion, and continue to support the hospital, continue to support our mission and spread that positivity about our small community hospital.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm going to say this personally because I'm sitting here with two guys that took over positions not that long ago. You just made a year, michael. You know Spanky did one term. He's in year five and I know you did a lot, michael, and I know you have a lot planned in the coming years. And again, patience, patience, kind of like Spanky I lived here it's going to be 48 years in December. I've never seen things happen in town the way they've happened over the past four and a half years. You know that man right there has been working tirelessly. He has. Sometimes it seems like, well, it's not enough. But what about that? What about this? And, man, you know it's like, okay, just pump the brakes a little bit. A lot of work has been done. There are more things to come and I believe that there's a lot of people in the right places in this town to take us into the future.
Speaker 1:I agree and I mean it's exciting to be part of Church Point. It really is. But we need some patience, we need some support, we need some positivity and I really believe in my heart that we're going places in town. I really do.
Speaker 2:I agree 100%.
Speaker 1:So, on that sentimental note, I'll grab a Kleenex. We can all dry our eyes I had a kumbaya moment right here. Michael, thank you so much, man, for being a part of this and shedding some light on what's happening, and thank you for all you do for the town of Church Point.
Speaker 2:I really do appreciate it, of course.
Speaker 1:Yep Spanky. Thanks for joining Again. You have any questions for our podcast? You can message us on the Town of Church Point Facebook page or you can email us towntalkquestions at gmailcom.