WOODVILLE – Tyler County Hospital recently welcomes new CFO Antonio “Tony” Chavira, Jr., to its administrative team. Chavira said that, thus far, aside from getting used to a different dynamic than what he’d been used to in the workplace, things have been moving smoothly.
Chavira was hired to replace Scott McCluskey, who retired after 12 years as the hospital’s chief financial officer. He describes himself as a “pretty laid-back, hands-on kind of guy.”
With more than 30 years of experience in accounting, Chavira has worked in a variety of sectors, both corporate and private, including banking and in retail, and while working in a hospital setting has provided its own unique challenges, Chavira said he has taken on those challenges, and is moving forward.
Chavira said that currently, for him, the terminology and all the different acronyms have presented the biggest challenges to plow through.
Chavira said he is proud to call Tyler County his home. As a resident of Ivanhoe, he and his wife Cheryl gradually made the transition to full-time residents from Houston in the last few years.
“I have developed a deep connection to this community and its people,” he said.
Chavira was born and raised in El Paso, and attended school in New Mexico, and he later moved back to Texas, to Houston, in search of opportunities.
He and his wife are empty nesters, he said, aside from their dog, which he lovingly referred to as their “dog son,” and volunteering has kept him busy. He currently serves on the Ivanhoe Volunteer Fire Department. He is a certified firefighter, and went through the fire academy in Jasper, and opportunity afforded to him by Ivanhoe Fire Chief Brandon Yarborough.
He has served on the fire department for two years, and said it is something he has enjoyed doing, and it keeps him busy, outside of work. He said that he and his wife enjoy spending a great deal of free time at the house, and tending to various projects, which he calls “piddling.”
For Chavira, a typical workday at the hospital begins with him looking at all of the banking transactions to see where the facility stands, financially. “A big part of my responsibility is making sure that we as a hospital are able to meet our obligations,” he said. “Cash management, making sure we’re paying invoices on time and making sure our payroll is being processed and our receivables are coming in timely...just keeping the organization going” are all parts of that overall picture, he added.
Chavira credited the sound financial leadership of his predecessor McCluskey for allowing such a smooth transition for him to come and assume the role.
“We’re definitely in good financial shape, and we have [leadership] who are consistently looking at different opportunities, such as grants and things of that nature,” he said.
Chavira, who said it has been a pleasure to serve in a variety of ways through his life, credited a higher power with getting him to where he is.
“You have a lot of professional people who get asked what their biggest achievement is, and personally for me, it was the realization that it’s not me opening doors for opportunities and blessings, but it’s God,” he said.
