County representatives said the initial negotiation faltered over disclosure of financial records among other issues; the SPMH board said they rejected giving the county control of the hospital’s 25-acre campus.“Give the county everything they need to run a hospital. Give them the land, buildings, whatever it takes,” said Cook. “It’s no good to anyone sitting empty.”Supervisors Kathy Long and John Flynn visited SPMH on Thursday.“I fully intend to proceed with negotiations for restructuring SPMH,” said Long, a strong hospital advocate.“We need to commit ourselves to the service and then determine how it is going to be provided,” said Supervisor John Flynn, who spoke to doctors and nurses to “get a handle on the problem.”Issues have become more important than service, Flynn added, and supervisors must “commit to keep it open; once we do that everything else will fall into place. Our fundamental first duty is to provide health services and it’s an obligation of county government to provide it.”Long negotiated with the county’s ambulance provider to add another emergency vehicle to the river valley and arranged for the county’s medical mobile unit to be stationed in Santa Paula for emergency response, among other measures to bridge medical needs.Opened in 1961, SPMH is one of three hospitals in the state built entirely with community donations.
County to address SPMH’s future, community reacts to closure
December 17, 2003
Santa Paula News
The Emergency sign over the entrance to Santa Paula Memorial Hospital has been taped over, and now people cringe when they hear an ambulance or a helicopter since the closure of the Emergency Room last week.
By Peggy KellySanta Paula TimesThe Emergency sign over the entrance to Santa Paula Memorial Hospital has been taped over, and now people cringe when they hear an ambulance or a helicopter since the closure of the Emergency Room last week.Although through the end of the week the hospital will provide first aid and refer patients needing emergency care to other hospitals, what happens thereafter rests on the shoulders of the Board of Supervisors who were expected Tuesday to make a decision regarding the future of the “Hospital on the Hill.”The State Department of Health Services ordered that the hospital ER be closed eight days before SPMH officials announced it would stop offering services. The state ordered closure was due to the shuttering of the SPMH Intensive Care Unit.While Santa Clara River Valley residents are struggling with the possible loss of the hospital and the only Emergency Room serving the areas almost 50,000 residents, many echo the feelings of Scott Rushing.“I’m depressed and angry,” said Rushing, a member of the Ad Hoc Committee formed earlier this year to study issues relating to the failing hospital.Councilman Rick Cook, a hospital management critic, said he is “sorry to see this institution that was built on donated land, with donated funds for all of the Santa Clara River Valley be closed because of poor financial planning, managing and guidance.”Cook said he is outraged that hospital board members and administrators vowed that the employee pension fund was current, and “now we learn they’re about $2 million behind. . .statements made to the council and the community were a smokescreen to cover poor management” by Quorum Health Resources, which had overseen SPMH operations since 1995.The county and SPMH had been negotiating an affiliation for months, talks that broke off recently and were revived with the assistance of Santa Paula and Fillmore officials after Community Memorial Hospital declined negotiations.
