September 29 - October 6, 2022
Dominic Kanduch, 9, cheers on the Titan varsity football team during the 2022 Homecoming Parade down Broadway Street on Friday afternoon, ahead of the Drummond Homecoming Parade later that afternoon, followed by the game that evening against the Ennis Mustangs. For game coverage, turn to page 5. For more photos of the Drummond and Philipsburg Homecoming celebrations, turn to pages 8 and 9. Photo by Gwyneth Hyndman
GCMC facing 'an extraordinary opportunity for change'
By Gwyneth Hyndman Allegations of abuse, neglect and drug diversion at Granite County Medical Center are likely “just the tip of the iceberg” in a strained work culture, says retired medical director Rich Molteni, but the facility is also facing “an extraordinary opportunity” for change right now, he added.
Molteni, who was the vice president and medical director of Seattle Children’s Hospital when he retired in 2009, moving to Philipsburg with his wife, Joyce, where they had built a house in 2001, has also done consulting work for the Granite County Hospital Board in the past and is a member of the Healthy Granite County Board and continues to work as a consultant for Joint Commission International.
Molteni said that he had not read the 74-page Department of Health and Human Services report, completed on Aug. 10, which led to the firing of a nurse and two CNAs, and an overturn in management, but as someone who had been in hospital management for many years, he had also dealt with similar situations, including medical professionals involved in drug diversion, doctors who battled alcoholism and in one case, a medical professional who turned out to be a sex offender.
“The hope is that the [Granite County Hospital Board] doesn’t see the problem that was described in the report and by the paper as finished, concluded - and now we can just move forward,” Molteni said.
“This should be viewed as an extraordinary opportunity to go back and rethink why it is that we weren’t aware of that. More importantly, how many other areas are there that will pop out as a problem. Let’s use this opportunity to figure out where they are and develop a very carefully thought-out, prioritized system of process improvement, making staff lives easier and patients safer.
“Just don’t sweep it under the table and think we can just go back to the way we were.
“(The hospital board) may think they have two new people and now everything is fixed,” Molteni said. “And that would be depressing.”
Molteni said it was his hope that new chief executive officer Chad Green and interim Director of Nursing Tim Rock “could lead this cultural change and focus on processes and systems and try to understand where our other risk points are.”
Molteni believed that one way of doing this would be to invest in a consulting team, possibly backed by funds raised from sources like the H&R Thrift Store - which has regularly paid for resources at the hospital since its inception in 1979 - and annual GCMC fundraisers like The Festival of Trees.
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Pburg prepares for Flint Creek Pass closure, Oct. 10 - 14
By Gwyneth Hyndman
Philipsburg is preparing for the full, 24-hour shutdown of Flint Creek Pass from this Monday, Oct. 10 to Friday, Oct. 14
Cathy Smith, Philipsburg Chamber of Commerce president, said that because there was still enough of a tourism trickle from Missoula, even as fall meant a slower season, most of the Philipsburg businesses she was aware of were sticking to their usual hours. The Philipsburg Brewing Company was still planning on holding their Brewfest event, beginning Friday, Oct. 7.
Philipsburg Schools Superintendent Tom Gates said that an alternate route that would bring the school bus out near Echo Lake had been test-driven by the school’s transportation manager. Their plan B, if the roads roughened, would be to take a smaller vehicle to pick up and drop off students at Georgetown Lake, which would be cut off from Philipsburg that week via Hwy 1. “We’re just going to have to be flexible,” Gates said.
(In this week's print edition of the Philipsburg Mail, the closure dates were stated as Oct. 3 to Oct. 7, which has now been pushed back to Oct. 10 - 14)
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Brewing Company expands - a Thanksgiving completion date is expected
By Gwyneth Hyndman
Beer business is going well for the Philipsburg Brewing Company - hence the 100 x 200 foot building going up at the town’s entrance which will be the company’s new warehouse, with a Thanksgiving completion date. Co-owner Nolan Smith said that as well as a warehouse and conference room, the building would also have eight office spaces - a few of these will be for rent for other Pburg businesses to base themselves out of.
“This is going to make us much more efficient,” Smith said, adding that the brewery would have a Montana-wide distribution, starting in December. As business expands, so have their needs and the company is busting at the seams of town’s original Kroger brewery location first built in the 1870s - which the Philipsburg Brewing Company bought in 2014 and transformed into a bottling plant and summer events venue.
All shipping and receiving will come to the new location, rather than traveling up through town to the top of Broadway Street, Smith said.
While the new building would be tapping into the town’s sewer system, they would be digging their own well and would not be relying on the town’s water supply, Smith said.
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GCMC facing 'an extraordinary opportunity for change'
By Gwyneth Hyndman Allegations of abuse, neglect and drug diversion at Granite County Medical Center are likely “just the tip of the iceberg” in a strained work culture, says retired medical director Rich Molteni, but the facility is also facing “an extraordinary opportunity” for change right now, he added.
Molteni, who was the vice president and medical director of Seattle Children’s Hospital when he retired in 2009, moving to Philipsburg with his wife, Joyce, where they had built a house in 2001, has also done consulting work for the Granite County Hospital Board in the past and is a member of the Healthy Granite County Board and continues to work as a consultant for Joint Commission International.
Molteni said that he had not read the 74-page Department of Health and Human Services report, completed on Aug. 10, which led to the firing of a nurse and two CNAs, and an overturn in management, but as someone who had been in hospital management for many years, he had also dealt with similar situations, including medical professionals involved in drug diversion, doctors who battled alcoholism and in one case, a medical professional who turned out to be a sex offender.
“The hope is that the [Granite County Hospital Board] doesn’t see the problem that was described in the report and by the paper as finished, concluded - and now we can just move forward,” Molteni said.
“This should be viewed as an extraordinary opportunity to go back and rethink why it is that we weren’t aware of that. More importantly, how many other areas are there that will pop out as a problem. Let’s use this opportunity to figure out where they are and develop a very carefully thought-out, prioritized system of process improvement, making staff lives easier and patients safer.
“Just don’t sweep it under the table and think we can just go back to the way we were.
“(The hospital board) may think they have two new people and now everything is fixed,” Molteni said. “And that would be depressing.”
Molteni said it was his hope that new chief executive officer Chad Green and interim Director of Nursing Tim Rock “could lead this cultural change and focus on processes and systems and try to understand where our other risk points are.”
Molteni believed that one way of doing this would be to invest in a consulting team, possibly backed by funds raised from sources like the H&R Thrift Store - which has regularly paid for resources at the hospital since its inception in 1979 - and annual GCMC fundraisers like The Festival of Trees.
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Pburg prepares for Flint Creek Pass closure, Oct. 10 - 14
By Gwyneth Hyndman
Philipsburg is preparing for the full, 24-hour shutdown of Flint Creek Pass from this Monday, Oct. 10 to Friday, Oct. 14
Cathy Smith, Philipsburg Chamber of Commerce president, said that because there was still enough of a tourism trickle from Missoula, even as fall meant a slower season, most of the Philipsburg businesses she was aware of were sticking to their usual hours. The Philipsburg Brewing Company was still planning on holding their Brewfest event, beginning Friday, Oct. 7.
Philipsburg Schools Superintendent Tom Gates said that an alternate route that would bring the school bus out near Echo Lake had been test-driven by the school’s transportation manager. Their plan B, if the roads roughened, would be to take a smaller vehicle to pick up and drop off students at Georgetown Lake, which would be cut off from Philipsburg that week via Hwy 1. “We’re just going to have to be flexible,” Gates said.
(In this week's print edition of the Philipsburg Mail, the closure dates were stated as Oct. 3 to Oct. 7, which has now been pushed back to Oct. 10 - 14)
Want to read the full story?
Click SUBSCRIBE at the top of this page.
Brewing Company expands - a Thanksgiving completion date is expected
By Gwyneth Hyndman
Beer business is going well for the Philipsburg Brewing Company - hence the 100 x 200 foot building going up at the town’s entrance which will be the company’s new warehouse, with a Thanksgiving completion date. Co-owner Nolan Smith said that as well as a warehouse and conference room, the building would also have eight office spaces - a few of these will be for rent for other Pburg businesses to base themselves out of.
“This is going to make us much more efficient,” Smith said, adding that the brewery would have a Montana-wide distribution, starting in December. As business expands, so have their needs and the company is busting at the seams of town’s original Kroger brewery location first built in the 1870s - which the Philipsburg Brewing Company bought in 2014 and transformed into a bottling plant and summer events venue.
All shipping and receiving will come to the new location, rather than traveling up through town to the top of Broadway Street, Smith said.
While the new building would be tapping into the town’s sewer system, they would be digging their own well and would not be relying on the town’s water supply, Smith said.
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