Hospital, county reach agreement

The rift between the county commissioners and the board of trustees at Memorial Hospital of Sweetwater County appears to be closing.

Through a joint media release, the county commissioners and hospital board announced making a number of agreements in regards to the interpretations of state statutes the two groups have argued over. According to the release, the hospital board will transfer ownership of the former College Hill Women’s Health Center at 1200 College Drive in Rock Springs to the county. The hospital purchased the building earlier this year, which led to concerns from the county about not being involved in the decision to buy the building and practice.

The hospital board agreed to provide the commissioners with annual updates regarding important transactions made by the hospital in the prior 12 months. The board will also provide the commissioners with the same monthly financial reports the board receives. The annual meeting between the two boards is scheduled to take place during the first county commissioners’ meeting in June.

The board also recognizes statutes that some agreements and contracts involving the hospital require the commissioners’ approval. The media release states the hospital will approach the county commissioners when contracts statutorily require county approval.

In regards to public meetings, the board also invites the commissioners’ liaison to the hospital to attend the committee meetings featuring three or fewer trustees in the committee. However, the agreement does not go as far as to recognize the public’s ability to attend those meetings.

Jim Angell of the Wyoming Press Association has previously claimed those committee meetings to be public as a subcommittee formed from another board creates a new quorum of members and does not need a quorum of trustee members to make it open to the public. The hospital board cites a decision made by another hospital board in Jackson to close those committee meetings, making the claim that the meetings don’t feature a quorum of trustee members and should not be open to the public as a result.

Commissioner John Kolb, who is the hospital’s liaison, said the two boards needed to find a path forward from their recent disagreements and believed formal meetings between both boards would have taken much more time to conduct.

He and Commissioner Wally Johnson met with members of the hospital board to discuss the state statutes.

“We’re not going suing ourselves,” Kolb said. “This is what that is.”

Kolb believes the hospital board and commissioners have slowly grown apart during the last 40 years and said the two boards needed to come together for the public’s sake. However, Kolb also admits they need to continue working together as some issues continue to be unaddressed.

“I know we’re not totally done,” he said.

Artis Kalivas, one of the MHSC board members, said he wished they could have gotten together much sooner to iron out their differences.

“There’s fault on that side of the table and fault on this side of the table,” he said.

“We’re all in this together,” Kalivas said.

The commissioners then met with the board in executive session to discuss a legal issue.

The commissioners didn’t make a decision after the executive session was closed.