During a rare public debate, Montezuma-Cortez Re-1 board members split over a request to back a proposed tax increase for Southwest Memorial Hospital.
At the Re-1 board meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 13, hospital officials outlined plans to upgrade the 40-year-old facility. The $16 million upgrade would include building an inpatient wing and ambulance garage and remodeling existing facilities to consolidate clinics under one roof.
The project would be funded largely by a proposed sales tax. In next month’s election, Referendum 5A MCHD would require a 0.4 percent sales tax – 4 cents per every $10 spent on items excluding groceries, prescription medication, residential utilities and nonlicensed farm equipment.
“It’s not our position to approve tax hikes,” said Re-1 board member Sherri Wright.
Wright explained that she supported efforts to improve medical care but not an official resolution to support the tax increase.
“I believe we’re overstepping our bounds,” she said.
Superintendent Alex Carter replied that board members could adopt the resolution, but weren’t obligated to do so.
“It’s not atypical for a board to pass resolutions of support,” said Carter.
Re-1 board member Jack Schuenemeyer, whose wife, Judy, chairs Southwest Memorial Hospital’s board, countered, stating the community needed better medical care, and the “fate of the school and the hospital are intertwined.”
Board members Pete Montano and president Tim Lanier sided with Schuenemeyer.
Newly appointed board member Mike Tanner reiterated that the board didn’t need to endorse an outside organization’s tax proposal.
“We have our own funding issues,” he said.
The resolution passed 3-2, with Tanner and Wright voting against it. Brian Demby abstained from the vote, citing a financial conflict.
If approved by voters on Nov. 3, the tax likely would go into effect in March and sunset in 15 years.
The Montezuma County Hospital District and Southwest Memorial Health System boards are helping to fund the proposed upgrade.
MCHD has pledged $1.5 million from its mill levy revenue, and Southwest plans to put savings from leases – about $200,000 per year – into the main campus.
Private donors have also chipped in about $330,000.
Southwest Memorial Hospital employs about 400 people, including 22 physicians and 34 medical staff members.
In 2014, it provided services to nearly 215,000 area patients and made nearly 2,500 emergency transports.
tbaker@the-journal.com