Y'all come! Check-In/Check-Up Workshop

Sonoma Valley Health Care Coalition
MONDAY, October 23, 2006
7:00 PM – 9:00 PM Vintage House
264 First Street East
We will start on time we have a lot to accomplish!
Please come early to register and get a good seat!

1. Welcome and Committee Reports

2. “What Have We Learned” – A Check-in and Check-up Workshop
Facilitated by Jonathan Gottlieb and Cathy Webber, our community workshop consultants.

We’ve done enough education. Many of you have sat through those meetings, absorbed the information and even asked some questions. Now it’s time for YOUR FEEDBACK. We’re looking for dialog about our next hospital based on what we’ve all learned. Bring your friends even if they haven’t been involved in the past. A chance to get them up to speed and to get feedback from everyone who attends.

For a reminder of the meeting topics and speakers, see the list at the bottom of this notice, or go to the “all meeting notes” section of this Blog.

A Different Kind of Meeting Monday October 23!

We need eyeballs!

No it’s not some Halloween prank. Sonoma Valley Health Care Coalition, YOUR volunteer group working to come to a solution about our next hospital needs you.

We need your eyeballs, your mind, your voice and your body for a check-in.
We’ve done the professional survey, we’re doing a mail in survey, but we want to check in with you, a little like a check-up, to see how we’re doing.

We need you to give us your thoughts and ideas about where we are, what we’ve all learned, and where we’re going on the road to our next hospital.

This will be a chance for you to express yourself and come to some concensus about where we are and where we are going.

We’ve learned a lot about what it takes to run an ER, about seismic rules and regulations, about eminent domain, about demographics, about ….. well, you name it, and if it relates to our hospital, we’ve had someone come to tell us about that subject.

Now it’s time to tell us what you’ve learned from all of this. Even if you haven’t been involved in the evening Coalition meetings on a regular basis, you have an opinion, a thought, a feeling about where we are and where we’re going.

Tell us. This is your chance. The first of a series of workshops to engage the community in dialog about our next hospital. Be a part of something big.

Vintage House, 264 First Street East
7PM – 9 PM Monday, October 23.

We’ll bring the cookies! You bring the eyeballs!

Sonoma Valley Health Care Coalition
working to find a 67% solution to our next hospital.

Monday 10/16/06 Coalition Meeting Topic

The meeting topic for the usual Monday meeting of the Sonoma Valley Health Care Coalition will be Dr. Roger Richter, from the California Hospiatl Association talking about California Seismic Issues.

We are not alone in the seismic cunundrum we are in with our hospital. Dr. Richter will help us understand the seismic issues we face and why they are so important. The more we understand, the better we will be able to decide the best course of action for our next hospital.

Same time, Same place -- we promise!
Monday, October 16, 7PM to 9 PM
Vintage House, 264 First Street East,
Just North of the Plaza.

A View From Sonoma Sun

In our hands

'“Whither the Hospital?” has been one of our recurring questions these last few years, and of course it was the question of concerned citizens in the Valley for many years before the Sun ever rose. Unfortunately, there is yet no answer to that question."

"We well remember when the hospital administration sat with the Sun’s editorial board last spring and said, in essence, “We can prove to you right now that the hospital will close in 8 months if Measure C doesn’t pass.”'

"Well, it didn’t pass, and it hasn’t closed. That’s thanks to continued good efforts by the administration, which we appreciate, but some credibility has been lost. That’s why we were so pleased to see the Plan B group form and step into the post-C vacuum. And why we’re so pleased the Health Care Coalition is active, though we wish Messrs. Pease and Edwards, the coalition’s designated leaders, could move its deliberations along a little faster."

"Nevertheless, the coalition’s process has been most interesting to follow, with a progression of largely disinterested speakers educating the community on sometimes complex aspects of hospital regulations, operations, financing, siting, and construction."

"Two weeks ago, the coalition heard a proposal, or more properly, a presentation, by Cirrus Health, a Texas firm that builds and runs private hospitals. If its due diligence pans out, Cirrus would build a new hospital at Eighth Street East and Napa Road, with NO taxpayer funds, and operate it in conformance with state laws requiring access by the entire community.
What’s not to like?"

"Well, as we learned at the coalition’s meeting this week, sewer and water. Those are the key problems that County Supervisor Valerie Brown and City Planner David Goodison identified for us. The county could, on its own authority, provide sewer service to the Eighth Street site, were Ms. Brown willing. And if the water problem could be solved, then the main regulatory hurdles would seem to be cleared, with no vote of the people required. That is, all the approvals could come by agency action – forget the daunting two-thirds majority of voters. No tax, and therefore no voters, would be needed! (Nor the cost of an election, nor the potential for another divisive contest.)"

"But how to solve the water problem? Wells? Really deep ones? Probably, water for the hospital is a higher priority than water for a golf course, but underground water levels reportedly have been dropping for years, in any case, and so water might need to be purchased, presumably from the Valley of the Moon Water District. And the district doesn’t serve that far east, UNLESS, of course, the land were to be within the Sonoma city limits."

"This fact ultimately puts the decision back in our hands, the hands of the voters, which is where it should be. Far better, that the citizens themselves vote to expand the Urban Growth Boundary to include the Eighth Street site, if it is to become home to our new hospital."

"A 4 percent increase in the UGB area would suffice, and the city could zone the connecting parcels as the county has them zoned now, so no immediate changes would result from the expansion of the UGB, other than to make possible a new hospital at the proposed site."

"So, fellow citizens, perhaps we’ll soon have the issue back in our hands. With rejuvenated leadership from the Hospital Board and support from the city council, this could work. Or not! We trust that the voters will make a good decision, as a community, once they have the opportunity."

"Other sites? Other proposals? Still not much from which to choose, and it may all be moot, if some measure isn’t put back before the voters, soon."

SVHCC Agenda 10-02-06

Monday night’s Coalition Meeting will feature - “A Health Care System to Serve Sonoma Valley .”

Discussion will be led by Norman Gilroy who is putting together a panel of speakers with plans for breakout groups to review such matters as:

* A Network of Health and Wellness Centers
* The role of Sonoma Valley Community Health Center ,
* Integrative Medicine and the current program offered by the Hospital
* The Women’s Healthcare Initiative
* And much, much more ...

This promises to be a lively, informative session. A preliminary discussion of the subject at Thursday night’s Options’ Committee meeting elicited genuine enthusiasm for the topic and its ramifications.

You won’t want to miss this one.

Because Shelly Arrowsmith’s e-mail system is down and I do not have the complete list of Coalition attendees, would you please help pass the word along so that everyone who has interest will know what’s on tap for tomorrow night.

Thanks very much,

Steve Pease


Download Presentation Summary (pdf)

Health Care District Candidate Forum

Sun to host health care district candidates’ forum
October 5th, 2006 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

The five candidates running for the Sonoma Valley Health Care District board will participate in a forum on Thursday, Oct. 5, from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sonoma Community Center.

Kathy Barnett, Lisa Hardy, Dick Kirk, Michael Norton and Arnold Riebli are campaigning for the two available seats on the board.Presented by the Sonoma Sun, the forum will be moderated by Sun publisher Bill Hammett and broadcast live on KSVY Sonoma at 91.3 FM.

Following introductory remarks from the candidates, members of the audience will be able to ask questions. All the candidates will have an opportunity to respond to all questions from the audience before making brief closing statements.

The event will be in Andrews Hall at the Sonoma Community Center, 276 E. Napa St., Sonoma.

Talking Out the Hospital Sites

New hospital sites sized up (from Sonoma Valley Sun)
Officials explain permit requirements, pitfalls of potential properties

"How hard would Sonoma County fight if the Sonoma Valley Hospital tried to use eminent domain to build a new hospital at Maxwell Farms Regional Park?"

"That question was posed Monday night by Arnold Riebli, a candidate for the hospital board, to Valerie Brown, the Sonoma County Supervisor who represents Sonoma Valley. It turns out that initially, Brown was interested in building the hospital at Maxwell Park, which is located at Highway 12 and Verano Avenue."

'“I thought there was space available on Maxwell Park,” she told an audience of about 60 people who came to the Vintage House senior center for a meeting of the Sonoma Valley Health Care Coalition. It’s the ad hoc committee that’s trying to figure out how to keep a hospital in the Valley following the failure in the spring of Measure C, the ballot proposal to build a new, $148 million earthquake-safe facility replacing the existing Andrieux Street hospital, which the state may close in 2012 under current seismic safety standards."

"On Monday night, as part of an ongoing series of talks, the coalition invited Brown and other county and city officials to discuss some of the planning aspects associated with potential hospital sites.Brown said that about a year ago she invited people to sit down in her office to discuss the potential use of Maxwell Park as a hospital site."

"For years, hospital officials have eyed the park, which they consider to be ideally located to serve the hospital’s customers. Another advantage: The park is inside the city’s urban growth boundary, which means city water and sewer service is available."

'“Quite frankly, I thought it’d be nice to be somebody riding in on a white horse, doing something,” said Brown, describing her initial hopeful feeling about the park site. But it turned out that the county has taken grant money, including federal money, for the park on the condition that the land stay in recreational use."

“I honestly believe that land is sewed up,” Brown said. “I don’t even know if you can do an eminent domain on property that’s conditioned the way that is.”

"And so it went throughout the 90-minute meeting. Brown and the other officials indicated that all the proposed hospital sites were problematic."

'“I don’t envy any of you the challenge of finding the optimal site for the hospital. You’re going to have to figure out the least-worst option,” said Sonoma City Planner David Goodison. He kicked off the proceedings with an explanation of such things as the city’s urban growth boundary. It’s a line voted into place by Sonoma’s voters in 2000 that more or less matches Sonoma’s city limits."

"The only way the urban growth boundary can be expanded is by majority vote of the city’s voters. The urban growth boundary comes into play for two proposed hospital sites: a 22-acre site on the northwest corner of Eighth Street East and Napa Road and a 15 acre site on the southwest corner of Broadway and Napa Road."

"City sewer and water? It’s on the Eighth Street East site that the Dallas, Tex.-based Cirrus Health proposes building a privately funded hospital and medical office building alongside an upscale medical spa proposed by developer Henry Grause and architect Michael Ross."

"In order for the Eighth Street East site to get city sewer and water service, Sonoma residents would have to vote to expand the city’s urban growth boundary to include the 22-acre site along with about 50 acres of adjacent property. Supervisor Brown said that she met with Grause and Ross early on, when the two were simply proposing a spa on the property."

'“Quite candidly, I said to the two of them: You have huge hurdles with this property. You’ve got some huge problems attached to this particular parcel,” Brown told the audience."

“'The next time I hear about the Eighth Street East project, there’s a (proposed) hospital... alongside it.”'

"She suggested that a high-intensity use such as a hospital would be better inside city limits. Brown cited a Dec. 13, 2005 memorandum from the Sonoma LAFCO, or the Local Agency Formation Commission, that concluded that the spa would be more appropriate inside the City of Sonoma’s boundaries."

"LAFCO is a state agency created in 1963 to discourage urban sprawl. Each California county has a 7-member LAFCO comprised of local elected officials, and one member of the public who weigh in on annexations and other boundary issues."

"Steve Sharpe, executive officer of Sonoma LAFCO, told the audience of another hurdle facing any site to be annexed into the city, even if the city’s voters extend the urban growth boundary: If enough property owners inside an area that’s being annexed are opposed, the property owners can veto the annexation."

"Other potential issues that Supervisor Brown cited with the Eighth Street East site is that residents there already are upset about truck traffic, that the site floods and that she predicted wine warehouse tenants on Eighth Street East would clamor for the right to open tasting rooms, should the hospital get built."

"Or, well water and county sewer? Ross defended the Eighth Street East site during the question-and-answer period, saying the most emphasis should be placed on “which parcel has the most chance of delivering a hospital.”'

"Following the meeting, Grause said that a Eighth Street East hospital site could use well water. As for sewer service, the county has a moratorium on new hook-ups. But Ross provided The Sun with a copy of the 1998 resolution that established the Sonoma Valley Sanitation District’s urban service boundary."

"The resolution says that the county supervisors can provide sewer service from the Eighth Street East sewage plant if “a significant public... need is served.” Under that criterion, Ross thinks the supervisors could provide sewer service to a hospital on Eighth Street East, even if the property is outside the city limits."

"A proposed 15-acre hospital site on Broadway and Napa Road straddles the city’s urban growth boundary.“There has been talk about bifurcating the usage of the property,” Brown said, or possibly building the hospital inside city limits with its parking lot constructed as a separate project in the county."

"Mitch Mulas, a longtime Schellville dairy farmer, said at the meeting that there are sites with water and sewer service that could be used for a hospital, but aren’t getting attention.“I don’t think you’ve approached everybody,” said Mulas, who declined to name the sites."