First Lady did not sign any disclosure forms

FIRST LADY HAS NOT SIGNED ANY DISCLOSURE FORM: Like Ww has previously reported that Oregon first lady Aimee Kotek Wilson has played a central role in Gov. Tina Kotek’s administration, participating in behavioral health staff meetings, meeting with outside policymakers and state advisors, and even participating in personnel decisions. But Ww has now learned that Kotek Wilson, unlike all Kotek personnel, has failed to sign workplace policy documents confirming that she is bound by state workplace conduct policies and ethics laws, including disclosure of conflicts of interest. An example of a potential conflict: Last year, Kotek Wilson joined the steering committee of Pathways to Resilience, a group that aims to “help states and communities advance trauma-responsive policies.” That sounds pretty benign, but according to Pathways’ website, it gets its funding from Aurrera Health Group, a for-profit national health care consulting firm based in Sacramento. Aurrera specializes in Medicaid and Medicare policies and programs, which make up a large portion of state budgets. (Aurrera did not respond to a request for comment.) Kotek’s office says the first lady is waiting for guidance from the Oregon Government Ethics Commission before signing any documents. As for the Pathways relationship, Kotek spokeswoman Elisabeth Shepard says it doesn’t pose a potential conflict. “The first lady, along with other first spouses from across the country, were invited to participate. It is not evident that this would justify disclosure as an actual or potential conflict of interest.”

OHSU PULLS PSYCHIATRY FELLOWS FROM COUNTY’S PROBLEM PRISONS: On April 30, Multnomah County Medical Director Eleazor Lawson announced to employees that Oregon Health & Science University would be pulling its forensic psychiatry researchers from the county’s jails. The fellowship program’s director, Dr. Stephanie Maya Lopez, felt “it was in the best interest of their program” to move the students elsewhere, Lawson wrote in an email to staff obtained by Ww. “(I) expressed my dismay at the impact this could have on our vulnerable population,” the email said. The Forensic Psychiatry Fellowship Program has played an integral role in providing much-needed mental health care at the county jail, where an estimated one-third of inmates suffer from mental illness. The psychiatry students rotated between different correctional facilities and spent one day a week doing rounds at the jail in central Multnomah County. The county fired its staff of correctional psychiatrists years ago, and all that Ww has previously reported that no psychiatrist other than OHSU fellows has worked in the facilities since then. An OHSU spokesperson said the fellows’ last day at the Multnomah County Detention Center will be in June. Instead, they will work at the state’s women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility. “Corrections Medical Director of Health Dr. Eleazar Lawson is actively reaching out to local psychiatric schools to see if we can create a similar community,” a spokesperson for the province said. “We recently hired another psychiatric mental health nurse and are continuing the recruitment process for our vacant positions.”

PAMPLIN’s financial woes continue: The indications of a tight financial resource that RB Pamplin Corp. and its subsidiaries continue to increase. If Ww has previously reported (“Walking on Water,” Ww(December 6, 2023), the company’s owner and CEO, Dr. Robert Pamplin, has seen the inherited fortune that once placed him on Forbes’ list of the 400 richest Americans dwindle to the point that he has sold dozens of shares of Pamplin Corp. and properties of subsidiaries to the company’s defined benefit plan, often at prices that appear too high. Late last month, a flurry of new public data shows that one subsidiary, Ross Island Sand & Gravel, is still struggling to pay its bills. The Multnomah County Tax Assessor has filed liens showing $79,963 in unpaid taxes on RISG equipment. (RISG and affiliates also owe Multnomah County at least $223,000 in back property taxes.) And unions working for RISG in California filed a $551,000 federal court judgment here in April from the Central District of California seeking unpaid collect benefits. Pamplin officials did not respond to a request for comment.

PROVIDENCE ACCUSED OF INJURIES AGAINST UNION DRIVELast month, the Pacific Northwest Hospital Medicine Association filed a formal complaint with federal regulators, accusing Providence Health & Services of firing a physician assistant in retaliation for helping to spur a successful unionization effort among medical providers in its urgent care clinics of the healthcare system. A Providence spokesperson declined to comment. The charging document, filed April 15 with the National Labor Relations Board, accuses the health care system of “dismissing (the PA) because the employee has joined or supported a labor organization and to discourage union activity.” The PA is not mentioned. A spokesperson for the union, Myrna Jensen, said the layoffs occurred in March and were in response to the PA’s involvement in a successful industrial action that began last December and ended in February involving 73 physicians, PAs and nurses at its eight urgent care clinics of Providence. join the union. Providence Oregon employees have joined unions at a remarkable pace in recent years, from 4,166 in 2020 to 5,765 as of early May, Jensen says. She attributed the rise to the health care system’s inability to translate rapidly rising revenues into fair pay for rank-and-file workers.