Tannery Talks: Protecting Healthcare for the North Country

Attend a conversation with Dr. John Rugge, moderated by Arthur Webb.

Join what’s sure to be an insightful conversation and discussion about the impacts of recent legislation on our healthcare system in the North Country and beyond. The event, featuring Dr John Rugge, takes place on Sunday, November 16, at 2 pm at North Creek’s Tannery Pond Center near Gore Mountain.

The impact of recent legislation on the Adirondack healthcare landscape.

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, approved by Congress and signed into law by President Trump, introduces new challenges for health care services nationwide, particularly affecting the North Country of New York.

In response, a newly formed Healthcare Coalition for the North Country, made up of 250 volunteers, has come together to understand and communicate the nature and impact of these challenges. The coalition aims to reach out to local friends and neighbors, as well as public leaders at the state, county, and town levels.

This upcoming interview at the Tannery Pond Center has been arranged to discuss the issues that we, as patients, our health care providers, and our local economy, are currently facing.

Organizers urge the community to collaborate to protect our personal well-being and the health of our community from serious harm or even destruction.

For more information, visit the Tannery Pond Center website.

About John Rugge, in his own words.

I spent my early years growing up in the Mohawk Valley, but took a turn as a young teenager when I saw a poster at the Gore Mountain Ski Center that described a certain race, some “Derby”, being planned for the spring, starting in North Creek.

In May 1959, my Dad and I stood on the bank of the Hudson River, taking Super-8 movies to learn whitewater canoeing paddle strokes. For me, this was the start of something like a life-long career--canoeing rivers all around North America.

Dr. John Rugge

There were, of course, interruptions along the way: four years at Williams College, for example.

Then came three years at Harvard Divinity School to prepare for teaching religion in college, but this plan was sidetracked by my giving another school a try—that being, Yale Medical School.

Next came medical residency at Albany Medical Center, which was interrupted by a phone call from a book editor interested in publishing a canoe book that I had started with my paddling friend, Jim Davidson.

Taking a break from Albany, I rented a farmhouse in an appealing little hamlet by the name of Sodom to finish the book and then practice somewhere nearby for the remainder of the year.

Big surprise, that summer all three physicians in Chestertown closed their practices and moved away. As an even bigger surprise, the doctors in the surrounding towns were all looking to retire, too.

Now taking care of patients in Chester, but having nowhere else for them to go, I couldn’t leave. While continuing my medical practice, I also worked to prevent this area from becoming a medical vacuum, which eventually led to my becoming the “founder” of Hudson Headwaters Health Network.

When asked where I actually “found” this network of community health centers that now stretches from Saratoga County to the Canadian border, I have just one answer: “In the hearts and souls of so many people who volunteered to devote their experience, their energy, and their time to make sure health care would still be here.”

Next, at Tannery Pond on November 16, I will do my best to answer questions from another health care professional, Arthur Webb, about how this area of ours is facing the same need all over again. The big question for all of us now is how to save health care for the North Country.

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