As an investigative reporter, I have long subscribed to the practice that "sunlight is the best disinfectant" to transform backroom politics that do not serve "We, the People."
The power of this sunlight, or transparency, was demonstrated yesterday at a special meeting of the Palm Drive District Board. At the meeting, which was covered in a Press Democrat article today that can be read here, the hospital board heard a compelling, detail-laden revised presentation from the Sonoma West Medical Center's (SWMC) top managers. Ray Hino, the collegial, bridge-building CEO that will be managing the new hospital, led the presentation, with the new CFO and COO talking about financial projections and sources of income.
The presentation resulted in a unanimous vote by the District Board to support the new plan, subject to approval of an operating agreement. Even Board Member Marsha Sue Lustig, who, in the past, has expressed skepticism about the viability of reopening, seemed impressed, calling the new presentation “great.”
Then, the public comment period of the meeting provided an opportunity for many supporters of reopening (myself included) to express themselves, as well as a couple of speakers who have long opposed the reopening efforts.
Sebastopol City Council member John Eder, who, sadly, still acts as the Council’s official liaison to the Palm Drive Board (and whose partner, Marsha Sue Lustig, is a member of the Board), trotted out the latest argument opposing reopening. Eder spoke ominously of a lawsuit against St. Helena's Hospital regarding its no wait ER practices that ended in a settlement and payout. Repeating an anti-hosptial talking point that originated with a column by Jim Horn in (where else) The Sonoma West, Eder suggested that the no-wait ER, and the hospital’s former CEO, were not successful, and implied that fraudulent practices might be what is coming to the new SWMC.
Council Member Eder apparently had either not read the rebuttal to these untrue accusations here on Wacco last week, or he cares less about the truth than about grasping at an ever dwindling assortment of argumentative straws to slander the hospital reopening effort.
But the new hospital’s even-keeled CEO Ray Hino thanked Eder for his question, and proceeded to explain that the lawsuit settlement had to do with too many angioplasty operations and nothing to do with the no-wait ER, or the former CEO who assisted with the reopening effort.
A little later, a large landowner from the Guerneville area spoke out about what she termed the “autocracy,” the “haste,” and the “coup” through which those in the Russian River corridor were being forced to pay taxes for a hospital and emergency room that, she asserted, people there did not need or want.
Hospital Board member Sandra Bodley, who has long opposed the efforts to reopen the hospital and who endorsed Jim Horn’s candidacy to join her in what would have been a Hospital Board majority committed to finding a use for the hospital building that excluded an emergency room or hopsital, encouraged the tax dissenter.
Ignoring the fact that a wide majority of West County residents voted for the original parcel tax, and that the explicit purpose of the tax, as well as the elected Board, is to provide a hospital with an emergency room, Bodley noted that the people from the Russian River area were “right to be offended,” and that the speaker was presenting a widespread sentiment from the community.
Then, in what was one of the most ironic accountability moments since the hospital closing was announced, Sandra Bodley looked out over the overfilled meeting room of 75 people, and asked for a show of hands of people in the room who were from the Russian River area and shared the speaker’s concerns.
Only four people raised their hands. Less than 6% of those present.
Then the Palm Drive District Board’s two newest members got to speak.
The soft, but forceful Dr. Richard Powers, who received well over 90% of the popular vote in the November electoral uprising that ushered in a new pro-opening Board majority, responded, “We hear from four people who attend these meetings regularly, but I have numerous patients from Guerneville and the Armstrong Woods area who are loyal users of this hospital, and who want to see it reopen.”
Dennis Colthurst, the former cop on the cop and doc team, agreed, noting, “of the 1,600 ambulance trips to Palm Drive hospital in 2013, 400 of them came from the River area. I was elected to open the hospital and that’s what we are going to do.”
Election Night Victors Dr. Richard Powers and Dennis Colthurst (photo by Jonathan Greenberg)
And so sunlight from our democratic public process continues to dissolve the few lingering arguments stirring from a small, but powerful political cliché that has been invested in failure as the only option for a hospital with an emergency room for our West County Community.
Meanwhile, a transformative consensus continues to grow: that the work ahead is not about whether or not our community will get a new hospital with an emergency room, but how We, the People, can support its success.