When Allina announced earlier this year a plan to combine Mercy and Unity Hospitals into one hospital with two campuses, the Hospital District board started having discussions about the impact of that decision.
The Hospital District has, over the years, contributed to capital projects at Unity but its contributions are just a small part of the funding formula. According to Allina, in 2016 the contributions from the Hospital District account for less than 10 percent of the total capital.
“We believe that the hospital board’s role is its relevance to what we’re doing, and its role is diminishing and is not something that is appropriate for the future. So, we’re supportive of the board’s decision to dissolve,” said Allina Health Senior Vice President Sara Criger.
Another layer to this debate is the looming election. Three seats on the Hospital District board are up for election and a coordinated campaign called, Save Our Hospital, is being run by three community members seeking change.
“Unity Hospital is a community hospital and the community deserves a chance to speak. Now we have a little time to help the community decide what will happen to our hospital, and what does the public have to say about it,” said North Suburban Hospital District candidate Linda Hamilton.
“Save our Hospital campaign is just people wanting to be reassured that their is going to be the services that they need in the community,” said Criger. “We are very much aligned with that. We look at the services patients need – that the community needs – most often we’re going to make sure we are there for our communities.”
Yet another layer to this complicated debate is a lawsuit that has been filed by 5 concerned citizens to stop the Hospital District board from executing a dissolution process. A hearing for a temporary injunction was held this week in Anoka County. The judge made no ruling at the hearing, but both sides were quick to claim victory.
“We’re very happy with the results today,” said Save our Hospital attorney Mike Hatch. “We went into court saying that they’ve been trying to dissolve it, saying their dissolving it. Today they said they only intend to dissolve it and we’re happy they backed off on that.”
“The Save our Hospital folks went in for, in simplistic terms, a piece of paper that tells the Hospital District stop what you are doing. That didn’t happen. It’s clear from the Judge’s view, his questioning that is not going to happen,” said Lepak.
In the lease there is s stipulation that allows Allina to purchase the property from the Hospital District for one dollar if there is no outstanding debt. With the last bond debt having been paid off in 2013, Allina has indicated their intention to execute that clause in the lease agreement. Hatch and his clients believe that further negotiations are warranted.
“Keep in mind that their is a lot of surplus property around Unity Hospital that the district owns,” said Hatch. “It’s very hard to run a hospital with limited parking for instance and that’s what would happen. So the board does have leverage. There are also issues in regard to the lease I made. We won’t make any conclusion about that now, but you can negotiate.”
The Hospital District board sees their role coming to an end and have decided not to levy any taxes for 2017. The election will determine the makeup of the board as it makes further decisions regarding dissolving. And in the meantime the lawsuit will proceed.
But, nothing will stop Allina for implementing its plan for the north metro region with one hospital operating on two campuses.
“The Unity campus is a strong community asset,” said Criger. “We have a very busy emergency department there. We have med services, surgical services, a lot of the basic out patient services are there and we see those things being there as long as the community demand and need for us to have them. We do recognize we have a lot of overlap between these two hospitals in our markets. The community really need to be regarded as the broader north metro community versus any one individual campus and that is our focus.”
Find information on all the Hospital District candidates here.
