Peoria County is moving to finally close the books on the Heddington Oaks nursing home.
The West Peoria facility closed nearly four years ago, but the county is still owed some $1.4 million in outstanding debts.
Heather McCord is the county's chief financial officer.
"We've had a lot of different approaches we have taken, and after these four years of collection efforts, we feel we are at a point where the remaining debt is uncollectible," she said.
Those efforts did yield some success since she came on board two and a half years ago, McCord said.
"We were able to collect about $600,000 over that time frame. It's not as much as I had hoped, or any of us, I'm sure I hoped, but I think it's better than what we would have had we not done any of these efforts over the past few years," she said.
The county board's finance, audit, and legislative committee approved writing off the remaining debt. That doesn't mean the county can't still accept money if someone owing money does come forward to pay, but the county is ending its active pursuits to collect the cash.
"We've just come to a point where I just don't think it's going to go any further. So it's time to take staff and let them, you know, work on other projects," said county board member and committee chair Sharon Williams.
The debt deemed uncollectable includes patient accounts and state accounts that weren't specific to residents. The full Peoria County Board must approve the debt write-off.
Heddington Oaks was built in 2013. It replaced the former Bel-Wood nursing home.
