Brilliant solution

About one in three students in the Webutuck Central School District has enrolled in a health care program right in their school. The staff at this in-house facility hopes to make that more than two out of three in the near future. It’s called the School-Based Health Center (SBHC) and it’s the first in Dutchess County, operating since it was set up last May.

As of last year, there were 266 such centers operating in New York state, with the bulk of them in the five boroughs of New York City.  There were more than one-quarter million New York students enrolled in schools with SBHCs in the 2018-2019 period, and of those students, about three out of four were enrolled. That tracks with the Webutuck staff’s expectations to achieve about 70% enrollment in the future.

The Webutuck district in total provides education for approximately 625 students in the towns of Amenia, Northeast, Ancram, Washington, Dover, Stanford, and the village of Millerton. The health center is located between the Eugene Brooks Intermediate School and the Webutuck High School and as a Federally Qualified Heath Center offers primary care and other services without regard to ability to pay.

As our reporter Deborah Maier illustrated last week in an article about Webutuck’s SBHC, this kind of open-door service is welcome in a community like northeast Dutchess County where health care options are limited and changing all the time. It provides an invaluable service to students, and families — and “can be a major time-, money- and academic life-saver” for parents who have to find providers who can see their children, and often take time off from work to get to appointments. It all results in a loss of academic and work time.

Maier’s report on Webutuck’s center included an interview with the commissioner of the county’s Department of Behavioral and Community Health, Livia Santiago-Rosado, an emergency physician who has practiced in the New York City area and more recently at Vassar Brothers. In the fall of 2021, then-Dutchess County Executive Marcus J. Molinaro appointed her as commissioner. Early in her tenure as commissioner, she noted the incidence of school absenteeism in some communities, and investigated reasons and remedies.

Students receive what they would get from a primary care provider, such as wellness visits and other testing, including for COVID-19, along with a number of other services.

Another aspect of this brilliant solution — and an exception to a students-only rule — allows families to take advantage of mental health services. Families can be brought in to work on whole-family issues that present in children and teens.

Students spend a large chunk of their waking hours in the school setting. Sometimes they just need a place to rest for a while, before going back to class. And that’s provided here, too.

Latest News

Amenia’s Elk Ravine Farm funds conservation through unique tours

Jim Archer of Elk Ravine Farm takes a seat on Billy the water buffalo on Wednesday, Sept. 10.

Nathan Miller

AMENIA — Jim Archer doesn’t look like a typical “influencer.” He doesn’t have a podcast and he doesn’t take jet-setting trips to Bali for advertising shoots.

But he has amassed a following of more than 100,000 people across his Instagram and TikTok accounts. Archer shows off his unique collection of farm animals and produces educational content about ecology and the environment all from Elk Ravine Farm, his property on Smithfield Valley Road in Amenia.

Keep ReadingShow less
Sharon Dennis Rosen

SHARON — Sharon Dennis Rosen, 83, died on Aug. 8, 2025, in New York City.

Born and raised in Sharon, Connecticut, she grew up on her parents’ farm and attended Sharon Center School and Housatonic Valley Regional High School. She went on to study at Skidmore College before moving to New York City, where she married Dr. Harvey Rosen and together they raised two children.

Keep ReadingShow less
‘Garland Jeffreys: The King of In Between’ at the Moviehouse

Claire and Garland Jeffreys in the film “The King of In Between.”

Still from "The King of In between"

There is a scene in “The King of In Between,” a documentary about musician Garland Jeffreys, that shows his name as the answer to a question on the TV show “Jeopardy!”

“This moment was the film in a nutshell,” said Claire Jeffreys, the film’s producer and director, and Garland’s wife of 40 years. “Nobody knows the answer,” she continued. “So, you’re cool enough to be a Jeopardy question, but you’re still obscure enough that not one of the contestants even had a glimmer of the answer.”

Keep ReadingShow less
Haystack Book Festival: writers in conversation

The Haystack Book Festival, a program of the Norfolk Hub, brings renowned writers and thinkers to Norfolk for conversation. Celebrating its fifth season this fall, the festival will gather 18 writers for discussions at the Norfolk Library on Sept. 20 and Oct. 3 through 5.

Jerome A. Cohen, author of the memoir “Eastward, Westward: A Lifein Law.”Haystack Book Festival

Keep ReadingShow less