St. Tammany Parish Hospital – A Great Success

St. Tammany Parish is no surprise a great place to live. The parish houses many great restaurants, shops, communities, top schools and places for residents or visitors to enjoy.  U.S. News & World Report’s listed St. Tammany Parish Hospital as one of the top in the nation in 2014.

St. Tammany Parish Hospital opened its doors in 1954 with only 15 hospital beds and today the hospital holds 232 beds. On November 27, 2018, the public hospital hosted a ground breaking on a $53.4 million expansion. The expansion will add close to 159,000 square feet and will include a four-story build-out. The number of beds will go from 232 to 247 with all private rooms.  Once the project is completed, the semi-private rooms throughout the hospital will be converted to private rooms.

According to Joan Coffman, St. Tammany Parish Hospital President and CEO, the first floor will be where the administrative offices and conference areas are located, the second and third floor will house critical care and medical/surgical beds and the fourth floor will be as she described “shell space” for future growth.

The expansion is going to be designed so that a fifth floor could be supported according to the architect, fl+WB Architects of Covington and the contractor, Milton Womack Inc. of Baton Rouge.  There is a three-year plan, Expansion 2020 Project, that includes the recently added new parking lot, and renovation of existing patient rooms. The expense will be covered by bonds issued by the hospital.

Coffman reports that 85% of the beds at the hospital are always in use. She states, “This is because of the (population) growth of the parish, especially western St. Tammany.’’ Admissions to the hospital rose 9% from 15,656 in 2016 to 17,038 in 2017, surgeries rose 14.5% to 11,000 in 2017 and emergency room visits hit a high of more than 47,000 in 2017 making a 12% increase. The parish has also started to attract more retirees which will put a huge demand on health care in the area.

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New Homes Are On The Rise

The housing market is booming and new home construction is benefiting.  NAHB reports that private residential construction spending has increased.  This increase is across the board from single family

to multi-family homes.

Mulit-family accounts for $64.2 billion which attributes to the majority of the increase. Single family was shown to also hold a steady growth with a 0.9 percent increase in the third quarter of 2018.

The Census Construction Spending data details this strong growth which is from 2010 to April 2017. The rise in construction spending comes from the high spending on multi-family. The annual nonresidential spending increase  was based on class of power which totaled $8 billion, office comes next at $7.6 billion and last is lodging totaling $4.2 billion.

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A Fair Pay Raise for St. Tammany Parish Employees

The economy is on the mend but still has a way to go.  Many people are seeing a pay raise but there are those who still have yet to see one since the up rise in the economy.  St. Tammany Public Works employees are hoping for a pay raise for 2019.

This hope stems from a proposal given by Councilman Richard Tanner during a recent public hearing. Tanner proposed a 2 percent raise to employees that work in the Public Works department. It

would cost the department approximately $273,000 for the 2 percent pay increase minus the department director. He sees the raise is justified because the department has its own funding source.  This source stems from a dedicated sales and property taxes. Many others agreed during the public hearing on the proposed 2019 operating and capital budgets that the employees should be given a raise.

“Public Works does a fabulous job and it would be my pleasure to vote for this,’’ said Councilman Jerry Binder.

Pat Brister, St. Tammany Parish President, feels that giving raises to one department and not the others “is incorrect and wrong.”

“Everybody in this parish works just as hard as Public Works,’’ Brister told the council.
Brister voiced there is very little wiggle room in the Parish Budget.  The proposed sale tax increase was a no go with voters last election. The two sales taxes that were denied would have brought in $22 million dollars annually. The current budget that Brister will be presenting totals to $99 million and will be adopted by December 31, 2018.

An Economic Balancing Act

After the fall of the economy in 2007, policymakers want to keep a healthy balance in today’s economy. The Federal Reserve does not want to repeat what some economist consider to be the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

According to a statement released by the Federal Reserve, the labor market is continuing to strengthen and the “economic activity has been rising at a strong rate.”

This week Fed policymakers agreed to keep the rates the same for November 2018.  The reason for

this decision was based on the continued growth of the American economy.  The Federal Reserve wants to make sure the growth stays at a healthy rate, neither too fast nor too slow. The benchmark rate, the determining factor for the cost of borrowing on credit cards, mortgages and other loans, will stay between 2% to 2.25%

Markets have gone up this month and the Fed will more than likely raise rates at the final 2018 meeting. This also suggest the rates will raise several more times in 2019. Policymakers explain that this is a standard reaction to the strong economy.  This will give central bankers some cushion if a downturn were to occur.

Not all of the aspects of the economy are at full force. Business investments have risen very little and the investors are curious to see if the Fed officials will anticipate a lower growth in next year’s forecast.

The job market is strong. In October, employers added 250,000 jobs.  Wages have also gone up 3.1% year-over-year. While this is good news for Americans, officials fear that low unemployment and higher wages might speed up inflation which could force the central bank to raise rates aggressively.