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Dwight Tillery: Center for Closing the Health Gap will cut spending

Dan Horn
dhorn@enquirer.com
Former Cincinnati Mayor Dwight Tillery, CEO of the Center for Closing the Health Gap.

The Center for Closing the Health Gap will reduce its request for taxpayer dollars next year and expects to spend about $300,000 less than anticipated this year.

The center's leaders sent a letter to the city last week stating they revised their budget request to help the city save money "in light of the city's projected budget deficit." The city is facing a $25 million deficit next year.

They also said they expect to spend about one-third less than the center's $1 million budget allows this year.

The notice of lower-than-expected spending comes about a month after The Enquirer and WCPO.com published articles about what the Health Gap has done in recent years with city tax dollars.

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In 2016, the center used city money to pay consultants $90,000 for job coaching, public relations and other services. It also spent $3,600 on the Black Agenda Cincinnati political advocacy group and another $8,000 on a civil rights lecture series featuring the brother of the center's director, former Cincinnati Mayor Dwight Tillery.

Tillery declined comment Friday. But in his letter to City Councilman Charlie Winburn, chairman of council's budget and finance committee, Tillery said the Health Gap would reduce its budget request for next year from $1 million to $750,000 because of the city's budget woes.

He said he also expects the center won't spend about $300,000 of the $1 million it was allocated this year "based upon current spending patterns."

The lower request is a dramatic change from the group's original request for city tax dollars in November, which was for $5 million. That figure was cut to $1 million earlier this year. The Health Gap also has requested $2.5 million from Hamilton County's indigent care levy, but it's unclear whether that request still stands.

According to a spreadsheet attached to the letter, the Health Gap had saved about $120,000 in personnel costs and $50,000 in other expenses at the midway point of its fiscal year. The letter did not explain what employees or programs had been trimmed to save the money.

Tillery's letter also did not indicate whether the Health Gap's programs would be impacted by the reduced spending. The group's mission is to improve health care and diet for minorities, who typically suffer more health problems and have less access to health care than the rest of the population.

The letter said the center still expects to work in the community through its Do Right Campaign and to expand the program into additional city neighborhoods.