If Schoharie County had a slogan it would be this:
“You do what needs to be done.”
For those words and doing what needs to be done in 2020—work few of us could have imagined just a year ago—Amy Gildemeister and the Schoharie County Department of Health have been named this year’s Times-Journal’s Star.
It’s the first time the honor has been awarded to a group, but fighting COVID has been nothing if not a team effort, Dr. Gildemeister said.
“Our nurses have been working seven days a week since March. Our front desk staff…fielding irate phone calls all day long, our environmental staff following up on complaints…It takes a lot of work,” she said. “It’s been non-stop. But in Public Health, you do what needs to be done. We all do.”
Also part of that team effort: the county’s COVID Task Force, created back in March, whose members include staff at the Office of Emergency Management, and the Sheriff’s and Adminstrator’s Offices.
“All of them, we ask them to do something and it’s done,” Dr. Gildemeister said. “Often they’re ahead of us.”
Agencies like the Office for the Aging, which keeps track of who might need groceries delivered; supervisors’ chair Bill Federice, who “has everyone’s back,” and school superintendents, who haven’t blanched once at the Health Department’s advice are also of that team.
“I know I make the hard calls, but the schools and SUNY Cobleskill, they’ve been with us every step of the way,” Dr. Gildemeister said.
“All of these people…our Codes Officers too and even the state, we’re all partners in this. None of us can do it by ourselves. It’s the reason we were able to keep our numbers as low as we could for so long. The support really has been community-wide. And now the vaccine’s coming.”
By definition, Public Health works under the radar and behind the scenes, Dr. Gildemeister said.
No one knows they’re there or what they do till something like COVID strikes.
“In Public Health, you can’t be reactive, you have to be proactive,” she said. “That means staying ahead of something like this and trying to keep it from happening.”
Even when attempts to make sure businesses and non-profits are following the rules put staff in the crosshairs.
“If you don’t enforce the law, then it’s just a suggestion,” Dr. Gildemeister said. “We try to be even-handed and helpful,” balancing health and economic concerns with basic freedoms.
“We always educate first and we try to provide resources so we don’t get to the point to where there’s a hearing and a fine. We realize the huge impact this has on everyone’s lives…”
Local COVID numbers will likely surpass 650 by Wednesday (see related story), but Dr. Gildemeister credited their efforts following up complaints and working to educate businesses for keeping them as low as they were for so long.
The Bassett Network and Cobleskill Regional Hospital began vaccinating staff against COVID just before Christmas and this week, the Health Department is going out to places like Marchand Manor, Prospect House, and the Arc residences to bring the vaccine to them.
New York State is still in Phase 1 of vaccine distribution and there’s been concern that the effort is moving too slowly.
But it’s the vaccine that gives Dr. Gildemeister true hope for 2021.
“COVID is going to be with us for a while longer, We can’t relax until we get people vaccinated,” she said.
“When you’re able to get the vaccine, get it.”

OTHER STAR STORIES--INCLUDING 2020'S OTHER NOMINATIONS--ARE IN THIS WEEK'S TIMES-JOURNAL.