DALTON, Ga. — As of Monday, the Partnership Health Center in Dalton’s Mack Gaston Community Center has closed, and some area residents are concerned.

Forrest Starks, 68, a lifelong resident of Dalton, said he hopes the space is filled quickly.

“We need some type of assistance in this area,” he said. “It will be helpful to those with no income or low income.”

Starks, who mentors in the community, said he’s at the community center daily.

“I see a lot, this city has too much going (for it) to turn their backs on those who can’t help themselves,” he said.

Steve Miracle, the CEO of Georgia Mountains Health Services, the Morganton-based nonprofit that operated the clinic, had said in a letter to City Administrator Jason Parker that the organization would leave three months before its lease ended on July 31 if its agreement with the city wasn’t renegotiated. Calls to Miracle were not immediately returned on Tuesday.

Parker said Tuesday that Miracle declined the city’s offer to continue to operate the center on an interim basis. He said he’d hoped the city could work something out with Miracle. 

“The city wants to have affordable health care,” Parker said. “That was the original reason the clinic was put there.”

Parker said city officials have been working the last few weeks to get a request for proposal ready for the space. 

“We’ll evaluate providers to see what kind of services they will offer,” he said.

Parker said whoever the provider is will “basically be leasing the facility.”

Parker said some of the things the request for proposal would need to know from potential bidders is how many days they would be open a week, the hours of operation, what services they will provide and if there would be access for Medicare and Medicaid patients. 

Parker said the proposal should be available to view on the city’s website by today.

Tom Brown, executive director of the DEO Clinic in Dalton, said that organization would be happy to speak with city officials about moving their clinic into the space at the community center. The DEO Clinic provides primary and preventive health care to financially eligible residents in Whitfield and Murray counties with no access to health insurance, its website states. 

“We would love the opportunity to provide greater services to the community,” Brown said.

A spokesman for Hamilton Health Care System did not immediately return a phone message on Tuesday.

City Council member Tyree Goodlett said the closing of the clinic is unfortunate.

“I hate they decided to leave after all we tried to do to keep them open last year,” he said.

Mayor Dennis Mock sent a letter to Georgia Mountains on May 9 canceling the lease effective at midnight on July 31 of last year. The letter didn’t specify why the lease was being terminated; however, Mock later said in an interview he had concerns about the clinic being open when it was supposed to be.

On June 2, City Council members agreed that city officials would try to renegotiate the lease. The sides reached an agreement in August

Goodlett said it “hurts” that the clinic couldn’t stay open until a replacement was found.

“It (the lease) was only a dollar a month,” he said.

In the letter, Miracle said that during the five years the organization had operated the clinic it had more than 19,000 patient visits and about half of them were by patients who had no health insurance. City officials said Miracle told them the clinic was losing money.

Miracle proposed three changes to the lease agreement:

• End the requirement that the clinic be open five days a week.

• Provide a financial subsidy to support the health care for the uninsured.

• Create a long-term contract.

Council members did not seem agreeable to providing funding for the clinic.

As for the five-day requirement, on Tuesday Goodlett said council members wanted the clinic to be open five days a week. 

“Everyone doesn’t work the same schedule so three days might not work for all,” he said. 

Goodlett said he feels good about getting a replacement soon.

“I’m hoping that after we send out the request for proposal we get someone in there that will serve the community because that’s what it’s for,” he said. 

Mayra Maciel, a receptionist at the community center, said several patients knew the clinic was closing.

“We had a few people come by looking for directions to the Chatsworth location,” she said.