At the July 17 Council meeting, City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz introduced Dr. Sam Edwards, the Hospital on the Hill’s administrator, and Michael Powers, the director of the Ventura County Health Care Agency.“It’s a pleasure to be here speaking to you under these circumstances,” said Dr. Sam. The City Council was steadfast in their determination that the hospital would reopen and never wavered from what became their top priority, Dr. Sam noted. “...You stuck with it, you’ve been the rock. The Council and Mr. Bobkiewicz were the reason that this happened,” and without their efforts the hospital would not have been revived.“Thank you very much.... Now we have the privilege of having a hospital in Santa Paula,” said Dr. Sam.Bobkiewicz said that the Santa Paula Health Care Authority - formed by the Council during the hospital crisis - and city are working together to produce a video about the reopened hospital. “Those who have not had a chance to visit the hospital” will be able to see “what good things await them,” noted Bobkiewicz.“I understand that the hospital has been widely used already in the short week or so it’s been open,” noted Mayor Rick Cook.
City Council receives strong kudos for role in reopening SP Hospital
July 26, 2006
Santa Paula City Council
The City Council was the recipient of strong kudos for their role in reopening Santa Paula Hospital when the administrator of the revamped and revitalized facility spoke at the July 17 meeting.
By Peggy KellySanta Paula TimesThe City Council was the recipient of strong kudos for their role in reopening Santa Paula Hospital when the administrator of the revamped and revitalized facility spoke at the July 17 meeting. Opened in 1961, the hospital - one of only three in the state built entirely with community donations - reopened July 13 as an arm of Ventura County Medical Center.Santa Paula Memorial Hospital was shuttered on December 19, 2003, almost exactly a year after trustees announced that the facility serving the approximately 50,000 Santa Clara River Valley residents was sinking fast. The potential loss of the only emergency room in the valley set elected officials and community members scrambling in an effort to save the facility through a hastily formed Ad Hoc Committee to study hospital issues.But the committee - comprised of area elected officials, Supervisor Kathy Long and community members - met with resistance when they butted heads with Quorum Health Resources, which provided the hospital’s chief operating and financial officers, who refused to let the books be examined citing “trade secrets” and other confidentiality issues. Finally let go a month before the hospital was shut down, trustees later filed an objection to Quorum’s claim for unpaid fees, citing mismanagement among other charges.The county was finally able to purchase the hospital last year for $2.75 million as a result of the deal brokered by the Creditors Committee that was accepted by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The City Council worked with the creditors and the county to allow the deal to go through by rezoning about 16 acres of vacant hospital property for residential development. Comstock Homes of Manhattan Beach was the successful bidder, and paid $10.3 million for the land. Hospital debts - including what might be million dollar plus payments to the employees’ pension fund - could go as high as $15 million.
