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Preventive Care, Priceless Support
Beyond the breathtaking natural stone arches and geological won-ders of Arches National Park, there’s another picture you aren’t likely to see. Many Moab, Utah, residents live below the poverty line, making do with seasonal work and low-wage tourism jobs. It’s common for residents to be uninsured or underinsured because of high deductibles, which puts the services of the regional hospital out of reach.
REALTOR® Danette Johnson has helped change that. As founding member of the Moab Free Health Clinic, she recruits volunteers, raises funds and develops donor relationships. She has also focused on maintaining community relations and expanding the clinic through a smart real estate strategy. Currently, Johnson is the clinic’s board president.
“Moab is rural in a way that’s hard to understand,” says Dr. Sean Buck, a volunteer physician and board member at the clinic. ”You’re not 30 miles from another town; you’re two hours from Grand Junction, Colo., for a Level II trauma center. Specialty care is even further away.”
In 2008, the Moab Free Health Clinic opened its doors, operating for a few hours a day with a handful of volunteers in a small rental space. “We were making things up on the fly,” Johnson says. She did everything from working the front desk to raising money—all while building her real estate career and raising her daughter as a single mother.
Johnson’s real estate expertise proved vital as the clinic expanded. “She not only handled several transactions over the years but also acquired major individual donors to support the purchase of properties,” Executive Director Kate Jagla says.
Today, the nonprofit owns a campus of five parcels with three buildings that house the clinic, the Moab Community Resource Center, a teen library and an adult education center. The clinic’s annual appointment volume has increased from a few hundred to 3,000, and its yearly budget has grown from $50,000 to nearly $1.3 million.
With 12 paid positions and a stable of volunteers, the clinic has been able to elevate the level of care it provides, offering physical exams, ongoing treatment for chronic conditions, testing for sexually transmitted diseases, mental health services, vision care, dentistry and in-house lab testing.
“Danette is a force of nature,” says Buck, who sits on the board and travels more than five hours from Denver on days he volunteers. “The clinic would not exist at all without her drive.”