Plan released to reopen Palm Drive Hospital

Palm Drive Hospital in Sebastopol would reopen with a new name, a 24-hour emergency room, new medical specialties and a business plan to start turning a seven-figure profit in its second year of operation, officials said Monday at a hospital board meeting.

The Palm Drive Health Care District board voted unanimously to accept the business plan submitted by a new nonprofit entity, Sonoma West Medical Center, which is proposing to take over management and operation - and put its name on - the taxpayer-supported hospital, which closed last April after filing for bankruptcy in 2007.

“I think we’re on the edge of doing something that ain’t nobody done before,” hospital Board Chairman Jim Maresca said.

About 60 people packed the shuttered hospital’s meeting room for an informational presentation of Sonoma West’s business plan, hatched by a committee that included Maresca and board member Sandra Bodley; Dr. Jim Gude, former head of Palm Drive’s intensive care unit; and Dan Smith, a former hospital board president under the auspices of the Palm Drive Health Care Foundation, a longtime hospital supporter.

The foundation’s target for reopening the hospital is April 6. The management services contract between Sonoma West Medical Center and the hospital board remains under review by attorneys, officials said.

Raymond Hino, the newly hired CEO for Sonoma West and the hospital foundation, said the management services proposal is a “once in a lifetime opportunity for this facility.”

“If we don’t do it now, it’ll never happen,” Hino said.

There’s a sense of urgency, he said, noting that the license suspension of the hospital’s beds ends in April and 50 to 70 former hospital employees want to return to work.

The business plan includes:

A 24-hour emergency room, operated on a “No Wait ER concept” intended to minimize waiting times by moving patients from the emergency room to an observation bed once they are stabilized.

A five-bed intensive care unit and 20 medical surgical beds.

Specialty “institutes” offering inpatient and outpatient services in urology, neurology, endocrinology and rheumatology - all new services at the Sebastopol hospital - as well as orthopedic and sports medicine, wound care and brain and spine medicine.

Private rooms for all patients and a menu including organic food.

Integrative medicine that will include acupuncture, hypnotherapy and massage.

“Our goal is to be the hospital of choice,” Hino said, noting that the new services and features are intended to draw patients from throughout Sonoma County and beyond.

The business plan said it will require $11.4 million to reopen the hospital, which would answer the demand on countless red and white “Open Our Hospital” signs posted around the West County.

Funding will come from $9 million in donations, including ?$5 million needed for start-up and another $4 million for future capital expenses, the plan said. The health care district is expected to contribute $2 million in parcel tax revenue in the first year, plus a $2 million transfer from the bond reserve fund.

In subsequent years, the district will contribute $1.5 million in tax revenues.

Sonoma West Medical Center would borrow $2.4 million to pay for hospital operations until it begins receiving revenue for services.

The business plan’s financial forecast anticipates an operating loss of more than $880,000 in the first year, followed by a nearly $1.1 million profit the second year and swelling to $3.4 million in year five.

Jonathan Greenberg of Sebastopol, who attended the meeting, said the proposed use of tax funds should not be considered a subsidy. “This is what we pay our taxes for,” he said, referring to the emergency room as “part of what we all want to see.”

Ariel Mullins of Sebastopol extolled the “herculean effort” by many people who “invested their heart and soul” into the hospital reopening plan.

“Share it with your friends and become involved,” she said.

You can reach Staff Writer Guy Kovner at 521-5457 or guy.kovner@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @guykovner.