PORT ANGELES — A record-breaking $1 million donation from the Olympic Medical Center Foundation to the hospital will fund new CT Scan imaging machines as well as wheelchairs and stretchers for the emergency room in Port Angeles.
“This might be the first time I have ever held a check for $1 million,” Foundation Executive Director Bruce Skinner said. “This is by far the most we have ever given to OMC (Olympic Medical Center) at any single time in its 38-year history.”
Skinner said the largest donation prior to this was just over $500,000. Over the course of 2022, more than $1.9 million had been donated to OMC, another record-breaking achievement.
“We anticipate going over the $2 million mark before the end of the year,” Skinner said.
“We have been very fortunate to be the benefactor of many generous citizens in Clallam County,” he added.
The donation was presented to the OMC board commissioners during their last meeting of the year on Dec. 21.
The reaction was audible gasps.
“It’s a good thing we are all sitting down because that check and that amount just sort of blew me away. I know we are all terribly grateful,” said hospital commissioner Ann Marie Henninger.
The funds have been used to purchase a CT Scan imaging machine for the OMC Cancer Center costing a total of $820,000. Funds donated earlier this year by the foundation went to purchasing a similar machine for the Port Angeles hospital site.
Another $180,000 was set aside for more wheelchairs and stretchers for the emergency room in Port Angeles as well.
“We really feel good about this because we have been told that due to the state of hospital finances throughout the country, we would not have been able to afford to purchase those machines,” Skinner said.
The majority of the donation came from a successful Festival of Trees event at the Vern Burton Community Center in Port Angeles on Thanksgiving weekend and an anonymous donor gift.
“On behalf of all of us, please tell the anonymous person how much their support means to the facility and our patients because you’re right, our finances suck, to put it nicely,” commission chair John Nutter said.
“They’re bad and getting worse at the moment, and we are certainly not alone.”
Nutter said hospitals across the state have lost over $1.7 billion as they recover from the financial impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We are extremely grateful for this donation,” OMC CEO Darryl Wolfe said.
“As we look at the age of a lot of the equipment that we have, we have been fortunate for a long period of time and for many years to have the ability to continually reinvest in our infrastructure, but that is becoming more difficult as we go along,” Wolfe said.
“So these gifts are amazing.
“We are completely blown away by the generosity of this community and the work the foundation does.”
________
Reporter Ken Park can be reached at kpark@peninsuladailynews.com.
