Commissioners vote to dissolve hospital district

Nye County Commissioners voted 3-0 Tuesday to dissolve the Pahrump Community Hospital District. Commissioners Cameron McRae and Dick Carver were absent.

County commissioners now will have to vote on dissolving the hospital district board and decide how to sell the assets managed by the district board, which includes Pahrump Medical Center and 12 acres of surrounding property.

"I've been in awe to see the amount of work these people have put into the hospital board," Commissioner Henry Neth said in making the motion.

"The hospital board, and it pains me to say this, no longer promotes the services to this community that they were tasked to provide in the beginning," Neth said. "I'd have to support the dissolution of the board."

Commissioner Joni Eastley said it seems one of her major jobs as a commissioner has been to appoint members to vacancies on the Pahrump hospital district board.

"A big part of success is putting the right people in the right jobs at the right time," Eastley said. "We're not getting the right people into the right jobs at the right time."

Commissioner Jeff Taguchi said dissolving the hospital board would not affect medical care in Pahrump. He said government involvement in medical care is just another burden on the taxpayers of the county.

Dr. Michael Reiner, who along with two other physicians is asking to lease PMC and the 12 acres from the hospital board, said he had a petition to keep the hospital district board intact. Reiner charged the request to dissolve the board was "a witch hunt" by a disgruntled former hospital board member. The fact PMC is currently closed is not the fault of the hospital board, he said.

Reiner said the three doctors estimated it would cost $1.1 million to run PMC with a doctor, nurse, X-ray technician and medical assistant, not including overhead. The hospital district functions with a little more than $700,000 annually in tax money to run PMC, he said.

"Should we blame the hospital district for a horrid job of former operators of this clinic?" Reiner asked. "The board did a responsible job trying to find another operator."

Reiner said Pahrump won't have a 24-hour medical facility for several years. When it comes to Rural Health Management Corp.'s plan to build a hospital, Reiner said, "even if they can build it I have some doubts about their ability to run it."

Hospital board member Alan Pope said since it was established in 1993, the board has fulfilled its mission to provide medical care regardless of a patient's ability to pay. Taguchi asked if the doctors take over PMC why the hospital board had to be in existence.

Nye County business manager Andy Reid said at the current tax rate, the hospital board bonded debt would be paid off in four years.

"Sale of the 12 acres of land would more than pay the bonded indebtedness of the hospital district. That I think is a preferable solution," hospital board member Wanda Blohm said.

Fellow hospital board member Patti Chipman said when petitions with 2,500 signatures were turned in to dissolve the board she asked fellow hospital board members to put the question on the November ballot.

"It did manage to get stalled long enough so we couldn't even do that. I implored the hospital board to write a resolution to ask commissioners to put it on the ballot so it would be a referendum of the people," Chipman said.

Paul Willis said the hospital board suffered a series of self-inflicting wounds.

"This board doesn't have any credibility any more," Willis said. "This board has ceased to carry the respect of the people and it needs to be put away."

Marian Lawrence, one of many former hospital board members in attendance, said there are six vacancies on the hospital board in the November election but only two people are running, a sign the general public isn't interested in continued operation of the board.

Johnny Walker spoke about a Nevada attorney general's ruling that the hospital board violated the Nevada Open Meetings Law in discussing business over the telephone. Walker accused the hospital board of two other Open Meetings Act violations.

"If you abolish the board you can limit the legal liabilities," Walker said. With PMC closed because of a lawsuit between former clinic operator Dr. Georges Tannoury over breach of contract, Walker said, "it's an ideal time for you, the county commission, to streamline government and eliminate a completely unnecessary level of bureaucracy."

"I resigned from the hospital board simply out of the frustration at the inappropriate management practices in place," former hospital board member Curtis Watson said. "The board didn't follow their own by-laws."

"The county already pays all the bills through the voucher system, you appoint the members to the board, so the county is really doing all the work," Watson said.

Tannoury said, "From the time they've been with the facility they've yet to prove their existence." He complained the hospital district was ready to lease 12 acres of land to Reiner's group, which wasn't included in the request for proposals sent out to prospective bidders. "They're nothing but a liability."


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