STANISLAUS COUNTY, Calif. — In Stanislaus County, Sheriff Jeff Dirkse wants “0” vaccine inventory at the end of every week.
“Our number one goal with all this is to get vaccine into people’s arms,” Dirkse said.
Dirkse, the elected sheriff of the county, also acts as the head of the Office of Emergency Services, one of many departments working on the COVID-19 vaccine rollout. It’s a newer title, which became official on Friday, Jan. 15, but he and his department have been involved with addressing the pandemic since day 1.
For most of January, the county was focused on vaccinating people who could give vaccinations. That was the point of the vaccine clinic on Scenic Drive, but, plans changed when the governor opened up vaccine availability to people 65 and older.
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Stanislaus County started vaccinating those people the next day at its Scenic Drive clinic. In the two days after the 65 and over announcement, they vaccinated about 3,200 with their first come first serve model.
“The decision that we made, we’re going to do this the simplest way possible and that’s having people line up and wait their turn,” Dirkse said. “It’s just simple and it’s efficient as far as again going back to that number one goal, getting vaccine into people’s arms.”
The rollout wasn’t without some frustration. Official received complaints about long lines, long wait times, weather conditions, and more. Dirkse said the biggest complaint that stemmed from the now-closed Scenic Drive clinic was about the absence of a reservation system or drive-thru site.
He said that a lot of new systems have been slow or caused delays in getting things done, “because the system crashes, the registration is slow, whatever the case may be.”
“Same thing telephonically… you have to call and make an appointment. That will slow our throughput,” Dirkse said.
That being said, pharmacies, medical providers, and hospitals are also getting vaccine supplies in the county.
“Many of those places are taking appointments, so before you come down and wait in line… check with whoever your doctor is, whatever clinic you use, whatever pharmacy you use. You might be able to schedule an appointment there, supply dependent,” Dirkse.
A list of approved vaccination providers under the current phase can be found HERE. These vaccinations are by appointment only.
As for the other issues with lines and wait times, it’s a work in a progress and Dirkse said improvements are in progress. You can expect chairs, blankets, coffee, water and more to keep people comfortable as they wait in line.
Part of that improvement process was moving the vaccination site to Modesto Centre Plaza on L Street and to Stanislaus State University. There’s more parking, more space to shelter people indoors, and more capacity for observation rooms after a vaccination is done.
Two additional sites are in progress for Oakdale and Patterson, but this will be dependent on vaccine supply.
The vaccine supply has been unpredictable in Stanislaus County. In San Joaquin County, health officials said they don’t know until the week before how many vaccine doses they’ll receive.
For Stanislaus County, they continue to expect vaccine shipments to scale upward, so they’re putting in the infrastructure now.
“Let’s face it, it’s a state of emergency. It’s an emergency and we need to treat it like that and we need to move quickly,” Dirkse said. “I would rather have stuff set up ready to go, a clinic, that we may have to turn on and off depending on supply rather than have people sitting in the public waiting for vaccine, having it sit in a freezer somewhere, waiting to get into an arm because we’re not ready for it."
Vaccine allocations and other vaccine information is available on the county's website and on the StanEmergency Facebook page. For the full Stanislaus County distribution plan and phases, view the chart below.
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