Board of Health votes to offer health commissioner job to Florida man

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- The Oklahoma Board of Health voted unanimously Sunday to offer the commissioner of health position to a Florida health official.

Dr. Leslie M. Beitsch of Tallahassee, Fla., is "far and away the best candidate," search committee Chairman Gordon Deckert said. Beitsch is willing to negotiate a contract quickly if Gov.

Frank Keating and state legislative leaders lift the current $125,000-a-year salary cap on the commissioner's position, Deckert said.

Top candidates, Deckert said, are not willing to take the position with its statute-mandated $125,000-a-year salary.

Beitsch, 45, said he earns $152,000 annually as an assistant officer for the Florida Department of Health. He supervises services and activities offered by 11,000 employees at Florida's 67 county health departments.

He was attracted to the Oklahoma job because of "an opportunity for meaningful change" following the state Health Department-nursing home scandal.

Beitsch said Oklahoma nursing homes should be regulated appropriately "with fairness" to both patients and nursing home officials. He also said a statewide anti-tobacco campaign would be one of his priorities.

Deckert said state health board members meeting Sunday in Oklahoma City were convinced that the new commissioner must come from outside Oklahoma because the agency "needed a fresh view."

Beitsch is an individual of "national stature" who appears comfortable moving into a crisis- or post- crisis situation, Deckert said.

"He's certainly prepared to take the job," Deckert said. "Dr.

Beitsch is clearly an individual who has been successful in a Florida job that is very similar to the position he would be accepting here. He has articulated to us a vision of how public health can be improved in Oklahoma."

Deckert said he expects Beitsch to visit Oklahoma for a second time in February to begin contract negotiations to succeed Jerry Nida as the state's health commissioner. Beitsch traveled to Oklahoma City earlier this month to meet with the board of health, an advisory committee assisting with the commissioner search, and Health Department staff.

A Tennessee native, Beitsch has a medical degree from Georgetown University and a law degree from Harvard University.

He's been with the Florida Health Department since 1991. He also was assistant secretary for children's medicine at the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services.

The other four commissioner finalists were as follows: -- John M. Robertson, 48, who since 1993 has been medical director for the 5,400-inmate New Mexico prison system.

-- Elin A. Gursky, a private consultant and epidemiologist with an extensive public health background in New Jersey with the St.

Barnabas hospital system, and as New Jersey's senior deputy health commissioner.

-- Garth L. Splinter, 49, a former chief executive officer for the Oklahoma Health Care Authority, the state's Medicaid agency.

Splinter is a University of Oklahoma professor of family and preventive medicine in Oklahoma City.

-- Robert D. Vincent, 58, Health Department deputy commissioner for health promotion and policy analysis. At the time of the May 2, arrest of Deputy Commissioner Brent VanMeter, Vincent was one of the agency's deputy commissioners.

VanMeter was convicted on a bribery charge and is serving his federal prison.