Bodega Bay residents one step closer to leaving health care district

A group of Bodega Bay residents seeking to remove their properties from the tax district that supports Sonoma Specialty Hospital in Sebastopol scored a victory this week.

In a unanimous vote Wednesday, the Sonoma County Local Area Formation Commission, which oversees special taxing districts, approved the coastal residents’ formal petition to detach from the Palm Drive Health Care district.

The decision triggers a “protest period” - starting next week and ending July 3 - that allows Bodega Bay residents to oppose the detachment and remain in the district. If enough people register their opposition, the matter could go before voters in a special election.

Bodega Bay residents pushing for the detachment applauded LAFCO’s decision, calling it an affirmation of their claim that the health care district has been poorly managed and is no longer supporting the medical services that voters expected when they approved Measure W in 2004. That ballot initiative increased the parcel tax from $60 to $155 to increase financial support to the former Palm Drive Hospital and maintain emergency, surgery, intensive care and other services.

In March, voters approved a deal that allowed the district to lease or sell the property to Modesto-based American Advanced Management Group and operate it as a long-term acute care hospital without an emergency department property.

“The taxpayers aren’t getting what Measure W outlined,” said Liz Martin, one of up to eight Bodega Bay residents pushing the detachment effort. “We no longer have an acute care hospital, and we no longer have an emergency department.”

Alanna Brogan, executive director of the district, said Thursday the hospital continues to be licensed as an acute care facility, and while it no longer had a 24-hour emergency department, it does have an urgent care center open 12 hours a day.

Last year, Martin and others launched a signature petition of registered voters and landowners who lived within the boundaries of the Bodega Bay Fire Protection District. The fire district’s boundaries were chosen for mapping purposes, but it was not a party to the detachment application.

Two years ago, the commission unanimously approved a similar request that led to the detachment of property owners in three school districts in the Russian River area. That effort also was launched with a voter petition drive.

Martin said she and her group gathered the required number of signatures, at least 25% of voters or landowners within the district. “We ended up with 263 verifiable signatures,” she said. The effort needed 246 signatures.

If those opposing detachment cannot rally as many signatures, the commission’s decision this week stands and the roughly 1,000 Bodega Bay property owners and voters will be allowed to detach from the health care district.

That would relieve them of any future debt incurred by the district, but it would still leave them responsible for paying down existing debt, said Mark Bramfitt, executive officer of the commission. It would likely mean a reduction to Bodega Bay residents’ $155 parcel tax.

Brogan calculated the levy could be reduced to $106 until the district’s current debt is paid off.

The district parcel tax currently generates a little more than $4 million, with about half of that going toward paying off debt. Brogan said the district has a debt of $7,706,347.

“We have a 10-year plan submitted at bankruptcy court to pay this off,” she said in an email.

That plan is set for possible approval May 29.

Brogan said detachment of Bodega Bay properties could threaten district plans to expand health care services along the coast, including the opening of a health screening clinic; enrollment services for Cal Fresh, Medi-Cal and Covered California, drug and alcohol services and other services.

You can reach Staff Writer Martin Espinoza at 707-521-5213.