Dave Holland, a nurse practitioner and nursing professor at East Stroudsburg University, was also an administrator at Gracedale and at Monroe County's nursing home. He knows about medical care. He also knows about nursing homes. Last year, Northampton County voters fortunately elected him to an at-large seat on Northampton County Council. Since that time, his insights and attempts to provide advice about the home have been strangely ignored by Executive Tara Zrinski, who prefers listening to an administrator whose background is therapeutic recreation. While she does zumba classes, the home is clearly and objectively declining. It was placed in a Provisional I license last year. Despite claims that things were improving, the state Department of Health has downgraded Gracedale's license to Provisional II.
When did this happen? When was Administrator Morton informed? When was Executive Zrinski informed? We do not have the answers to these questions, but the public itself was in the dark until earlier this week.
The most important question is what does a Provisional II license mean? Despite attempts by Council President Ken Kraft to muzzle Holland at last night's meeting, he explained in very clear terms precisely what options are now available to the state Department of Health, and it's pretty bad. Here's what Holland said:
If we don't resolve our noncompliance status, we're not going to have to worry about the continuum of care because we won't be able to have the license to do so.
So what do I mean by that?
So, in a provisional license status, every day that goes by that we're not in compliance, there are remedies that are available to the Department of Health, which they have not instituted yet, but they certainly could at any day.
That includes denial of new admissions to the facility.
If we're denied admissions to the facility, we're not allowed to carry out the mission of Gracedale, which I'm going to read to you.
Gracedale is a skilled nursing facility that serves the medically challenged and financially indigent residents of Northampton County and surrounding communities. The mission of the facility is to rehabilitate its residents to their highest practical level of medical, social, and psychosocial well-being.
If we get into a situation because of noncompliance, fair or not, that's the situation we're in from the Department of Health.
We're not gonna' be able to meet that mission because we may be denied admission at some point.
Second to that, the other option is to deny payment.
And again, we will not be able to comply with our mission to the residents of Northampton County if we're going to be denied payment for Medicaid or Medicaid residents.
There's a process where the agreement to provide payment for Medicare Medicaid can start, they can start that process to nullify and separate from that agreement based on noncompliance.
So the other options are temporary management.
If we don't get into compliance within a certain period of time, they can basically deem we are no longer capable of managing it ourselves and institute temporary management.
37 comments:
Wise words, but did anyone on council (AKA the island of misfit toys) grasp the meaning?
Dumping wokeness on Gracedale is the crowning insult. Nice job, Tara, you simpleton. (Poster's Note: this comment was created without use of ChatGPT)
It’s disgraceful that Kraft tried to stop David Holland from speaking the truth about a Provisional II license. This is serious, folks and still there are those who want to rationalize this situation as not being a big deal . It is! The only outcome that would be of any type of positive for Gracedale is for DOH to place a temporary management company on site. Losing payment sources and or the ability to admit residents will result in an overall “nail in that proverbial coffin” for Gracedale. Sad as that is, perhaps it will finally expose that what has apparently been going on for years with Gracedale has ended with this fiasco. Tara continues to apparently not get it or does and is still trying to pretend it’s not that bad. It is bad!
. We have regular meetings where Council members have every opportunity to raise issues and discuss whatever concerns they may have. Yet despite the fact that this topic was not even on the agenda, he once again seized the opportunity to commandeer the discussion and turn it into another one of his endless lectures on how Gracedale should be run.
Give him an inch and he’ll take a mile. Every meeting becomes the same performance: lengthy speeches about what Gracedale needs, what management should be doing, and how operations should be handled. The problem is that he is a member of County Council, not the Executive Branch. He has no responsibility for the day-to-day management of Gracedale or any other county department, yet he continues to act as though he is the county’s unelected operations director.
What makes it even more remarkable is that when he actually worked there over a decade ago, helping eliminate positions at the direction of John Brown, he apparently didn’t possess the same concern for operational excellence that he endlessly preaches about today.
County Council understands exactly what is happening at Gracedale. We understand what a provisional license is, why it exists, and what is being done to address it. Repeating the same talking points meeting after meeting does not educate anyone. It simply wastes everyone’s time.
At some point, this stops being oversight and starts becoming self-promotion. The rest of us are trying to conduct county business. He seems more interested in hearing himself talk
Politicians are only good for lies and taxing.
Let’s hope other news publications pick up this story.
I was not present but from Bernie post it seems he was educating everyone present. If you are a council member and chose to post anonymously and admonish his comments that says a lot about you. Council and the county executives for years have ignored the warnings from gracedale management on the o going problems. No one stood up for them. John brown at least purchased needed and ignored necessary items like lifts and beds that were in terrible condition. He did hear management complaints and needs. DOH doesn't like giving provisional especially to county homes like gracedale. They have to be in big trouble for this to happen. What was not mentioned were if any fines were given based on deficiencies. I cant help but think that census was pushed to keep income beyond where staffing could handle. That direction I know didn't come from home management. If you know all the problems how about you offer some solutions instead of bashing a fellow councilman.
Tara, please give Kenny a cookie, or two, sounds like he needs comfort food.
12:48 (Ken), Your comment starts off with a bit of dishonesty, which is nothing new from you. That meeting was ALL about Gracedale, both on and off agenda. It started off with an emotional appeal from Zrinski about her mother at Gracedale, which I've now heard numerous times. It starts to lose its effect after the third or fourth time. It continued with an effort to downplay 4 recent deficiencies and a downgrade to Provisional II during her Exec report. What then followed was an exec session in which Michelle Morton, the Gracedale admin who went into the back room with you, attempted to scapegoat others like she and Sue Wandalowski have been doing to Jen King. Then you had several matters related to staffing at Gracedale, I believe at least four. So you are completely full of it when you try to pretend Gracedale was not on the agenda. .
Holland chose to speak at an odd time, I'll agree, He's new at this, unlike you. He probably should have confronted Zrinski after her report except that you all ran off and into exec session to do your scapegoating. He probably should have started before the continuum of care positions were brought uo. But he was right to bring it up. You have a serious problem there. You say glass half full, but that glass should be completely full. Before the county fills any new director, slots or embarks in a new direction based on the advice of someone whose only accomplishment is a record number of DOH visits, you need to consider what someone who knows what he is talking about and who you are very fortunate to have on council with you, has to say. He's even a member of your party and ran with Zrinski.
Tara should listen to him, a person who has a background in nursing and successful nursing home admin and who even teaches nursing as opposed to a zumba dancer. If you want Tara to succeed, and I certainly do, then tell her she needs to lean on him. If you want Gracedale to succeed, then tell her she MUST lean on him.
Holland has been nothing but a gentleman during his brief stay on Council. He has spoken about Gracedale, but not in the way you've dishonestly presented it. He has been rather soft-spoken and has actually been far more modest than he could be. He is nothing like you.
I find your claim of self-promotion completely dishonest as well. You allow Warren to promote all kinds of issues in his effort at promoting himself to the state house, but get condescending and attempt to muzzle a person wgho can tell us in plain English why we need to be concerned.
Thanks for the lecture Commissioner, but the fact is that Mr. Holland worked at Gracedale during the Stoffa administration and his management company made great strides in turning it around. John Brown left a surplus in the home's budget.The current downward spiral began with the firing of the DON on day 1 of the McClure administration. Tara inherited a mess and hasn't made any progress. BTW, what was the 2025 operating deficit?
This clearly is a response from a team Tara council member (or maybe a few of them in one blog). . Maybe and just maybe Mr. Holland is explaining the Provisional II license so the public will understand the severity of this situation because Tara and many others on council are downplaying the entire issue. Taking swipes at the only guy who can be helpful in this situation is like “cutting off a nose to spite a face”. The public watching these meetings sees everything through the wonder of You Tube. So tired of the knee jerking when problems arise. The battle cry has been “You just want to sell Gracedale so you are saying bad things about it”. All of that bickering and accusations against staff supposedly reporting to DOH to “make things look bad”. You Tube is great especially since one can watch present and past council meetings! And the public is watching! Wait until the press plants this story on the front page.
Let’s hope
Another case of social media influencing the public. Bernie your part of the problem. Your presenting your opinion not the objective facts. I would love to know how you know what was said during an executive session?
It gets better.....Now they have residents being slapped by employees on T7 and abused and all incident reports go missing!! And let staff still work!!
1016. Thank you for the DON comment. Much appreciated!
It is called an inference. The purpose of the exec session was to discuss "personnel." The Gracedale administrator was part of the exec session, and so was the director of human services, who is supposed to have nothing to do with Gracedale anymore but is still very involved. Thus, it is clear that they were there to discuss personnel at Gracedale. Also, I know for a fact that they have been bad-mouthing Jennifer Stewart King, the former administrator and director of admissions at every opportunity. Zrinski even stated that admissions is now being more selective than it was when Jennifer did admissions and the county was trying to increase census to pay the bills. Thus it is as plain as the nose on your face that they are saying the problem is people who are no longer there. Quite convenient. It misses the fact that DOH could have its own office at Gracedale since Morton took over.
Please report this to the Department of Health immediately.
Let’s dumb it down. Physician ordered as needed anti anxiety medication but did not correctly order it for only fourteen days as per regulations. No one noticed it until DOH did. Boots to prevent skin breakdown were ordered but not applied by staff.DOH discovered it. Nurse or nurses gave a medication for blood pressure management that slows the heart rate .. The heart rate was below 60 on numerous documented occasions. The order stated to not administer this medication if the heart rate was below 60. Uh oh! DOH discovered nursing had given it many times. Blood sugar readings of over 300 for a resident were to be reported to the physician. DOH determined that reporting did not occur in several occasions. Reason - nurses supposedly did not know what more than and less than symbols mean/meant. Duh! Minimum Data Set(s) (profile of resident generated for payment and care planning )were incorrect (dialysis and falls). Staffing was below minimum with the response being that those days were staffed initially but employees then “called off” and no one (supervisor/scheduler) apparently filled in those vacant spots. Duh! A physician ordered a stool sample to be obtained for a resident to check for the presence of blood. The nurse did not process the order correctly and apparently thought this was a task for the lab. Duh again. None of these citations are related to the type of resident admitted, Tara, (well, maybe the schizoaffective bipolar disorder for the anti anxiety but maybe not). It is all negligence and should never have occurred at all. You are literally ignoring the only commissioner who worked for a period time for the management company at Gracedale that eventually brought it up to five stars with back to back deficiency free surveys. Sure, that’s a good idea! And it’s only June.
With McClure out, there’s a new bully in town, Kraft. The difference is, Kraft is a dumbass. Holland is providing a clear warning, but dumbass Kraft couldn’t comprehend what he was saying so he tried to shut him down. Good for Holland pushing back on him. He has every right to do so. As for Fruit Loops, she doesn’t understand ANYTHING. She’s a puppet. The question is, who is running the county, because clearly she’s not. She’s clueless. She can never answer a question without looking for help and is a deer in headlights. She’s just a political figure who attends ceremonies. Even then she sucks. Go Holland. He’ll have the last laugh when Gracedale is shut down and he sits back and says, I told you so. Oh, and in the end, bullies get there’s.
WTG, Bernie. A council member hiding under anonymous, yet we all know who it was. McClure’s Three Stooges, Kraft, Warren and Keegan, are now Tara’s Three Stooges, although she should be s Stooge because she’s clueless. Go Holland! A council member who works for the good of the people he represents, unlike Kraft, Warren or Keegan. They have their own agenda, as did McClure and Now Fruit Loops.
It was easy to figure out.
One can only pray that Tara, Sue, Michelle, Ken, Jeff, Kelly (think I named them all) will stop the cover up
already. Employees allegedly slapping residents and hiding incident reports? That’s the third strike there.
Excuse me?
Rarely agree but Bernie has it right. This complicit council and administration have refused to address and accept real Gracedale issues, for years. They now have, at their table, a competent and informed councilman capable of injecting worthwhile suggestions to help, and they are openly refusing it
its a bad look for all of them.
Luckily most people are smart enough to not believe anonymous comments on social media are facts. There are a handful of the same people commenting here. I would be willing to bet a few are posted from Laurie Vargo Hefner, David Holland, Terri Fadem and a disgruntled employees from Gracedale.
Bernie has posted the state nursing home site for all to reference regarding Gracedale and any other nursing home in Pennsylvania. None other than Gracedale appear to have a Provisional 2 license. If that’s too complex for the apparent still hecklers and doubters, maybe reference the “dumbed down” version politely submitted by a concerned reader of the 5/1/2026 inspection. Only someone complicit to this situation would continue to write nonsense about this being some type of vendetta anonymously written by certain people. The facts don’t lie but perhaps believe otherwise. Will see what the tone is when Gracedale’s management is taken over temporarily at the direction of DOH or it is closed. Both are legitimate possibilities so frankly and truthfully presented by Commissioner Holland.
If indeed any employee is aware of any resident abuse and fails to report it they also committed abuse according to policy and should be fired and certification or license should be suspended or revoked. Any employee with first hand knowledge is obligated to go through the chain of command to report but if that fails has an obligation to report to DOH.
And I thought tower 7 was closed?
@10:33 the few times that I have posted a comment on this blog, it has never been anonymously. I wish everyone would display some courage and do the same.
If your so courageous, why are you hiding behind Lori? It appears almost every vote you follow what she’s told you to do.
Ok David
Understood but some things are better left as anonymous. And at least know that there are those in the community who truly do understand what has happened and is happening to Gracedale. How else could one be so accurate in “dumbing it down?”Those telling you everything is fine, Theresa, are lying to you. Thanks for serving !
Not David! Good guess though!
And you boobs are voting for whatever you are told by the administration. Read a civics book or too, while windbag Warren is making one of his campaign speeches.
Theresa, it is honorable to show your name, but the option is a choice on this.blog.Many viewers choose to share opinion without fear of personal retribution, and Bernie, over the years, has stated his appreciation for honesty but his blog allows room for those of us who enjoy freedom of
secrecy as a choice. Bernie can determine who is anonymous anyway.
The word is ...incident report missing.... The employee is back working on same floor with abused resident....I know people who work there......
Holland seems to be the only concerned and responsive councilman making any effort to work toward aiding gracedale. The damage that is being caused now must be addressed. Where are these elected paid representatives ? Why have they not taken this seriously enough to have a rapid response? Talk to other successful nursing homes and management teams and stop waiting for it to go away!
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