County needs nurses
By Terry Murry on Tuesday, August 2nd, 2022 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
UMATILLA COUNTY – The Umatilla County Public Health Department needs help. It’s experiencing a shortage of public health nurses that has forced clinics in Hermiston and Pendleton to cut back when they are open.
“We’ve had to cut back because we just don’t have the staff to make it happen,” Director Joseph Fiumara said. “Right now our clinic hours in Pendleton are on Tuesdays and our clinic hours in Hermiston are on Fridays.”
Fiumara said there is need to expand that, but the department needs to fill four or five open positions before UCo Health can get back to normal operations. One thing that could help is the Umatilla County Board of Commissioners has increased the compensation for public health nurses.
“Anyone out there who’s looked at these in the past and decided it was too much work for what the compensation was worth, it might be worth taking another look at that,” he said.
Public health nurse and other positions available at Umatilla County can be found at https://umatilla.casellehire.com/jobs/.
