 |
||||||||
 |
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
Leaders hope to entice hospitals
By JENNIFER GOLDBLATT, Times Staff Writer NEW PORT RICHEY -- City officials think they can make it worthwhile for Community and North Bay hospitals to stay put. The chief executive of Community Hospital seems to be taking the city's proposals seriously. He's asked that information from further talks be kept a secret. "If they weren't interested in talking with us, they wouldn't have asked us to keep it confidential," said City Manager Gerald Seeber. "I'm encouraged by it." Seeber met with Community Hospital chief executive Ernie Meier on March 1, two weeks after the hospital said it planned to move out of the city. At the meeting, Seeber explained that as a Community Redevelopment Area, the city had financing tools that it might be able to use to help the hospital accomplish its goals. That may include assembling land, raising money, providing parking or a number of other options. After the meeting, Meier asked Seeber to keep confidential all records concerning the hospital's plans, intentions or interests to relocate or expand. On Tuesday evening, the City Council backed Seeber's efforts. Sitting as directors of the city's community redevelopment agency, they unanimously directed city staffers to work with the hospitals to encourage them to stay, and to convey to the state the city's concerns about the hospitals departures. The city wants both hospitals to stay. Seeber has not yet approached North Bay, which also announced its intention to leave, but says he plans to do so. Community Hospital, owned by HCA-The Healthcare Co., is the city's biggest taxpayer and employer with 1,050 people on staff and an annual city tax bill of $245,000. North Bay does not pay property taxes since it is owned by nonprofit Morton Plant Mease, but it employs a staff of 500. Both hospitals must get permission to move from the state's Agency for Healthcare Administration, which will render a decision in June. Meier could not be reached for comment Wednesday. North Bay spokeswoman Beth Hardy declined to comment. The city's efforts come as both hospitals are lobbying local community and business leaders to support their respective moves. Pasco county commissioners decided Tuesday to ask the hospitals to present their cases at a commission meeting March 26. Commissioner Ann Hildebrand sits on the board of North Bay while commissioner Peter Altman sits on the board of Community Hospital. Altman is also the former mayor of New Port Richey. Community Hospital has hired a Tampa public relations firm, Roberts Communications and Marketing, to help sell the hospital's position. The Community Redevelopment Area label, which the city adopted last year after a finding that the city was "blighted," includes a program that channels increases in tax revenues to redevelopment programs. The city expects to collect about $14-million in those revenues over the next 10 years. Mayor Wendy Brenner thinks even the departure of both hospitals would not necessarily mean disaster. "That's a big piece of property, that we've never had before and it could be marketed in a hundred different ways -- make it a nice gated community, some sort of community center, a shopping center or bring in some outside developers," Brenner said. "I certainly don't want to see them go, but both hospitals are located in areas that could use some redevelopment."
 © 2006 • All Rights Reserved • Tampa Bay Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 
|
From today's Pasco Times |
