• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

Authority Bills May Be Paid By New Hospital Company

Posted on: Saturday, 24 September 2005, 00:00 CDT

Sep. 23--SHALLOTTE, N.C. -- Brunswick County has been billed $18,877 for the first 67 hours Raleigh attorneys and paralegals have spent helping the Brunswick County Hospital Authority find a new company to take over at the county-owned hospital.

Raleigh attorney Renee Montgomery said Thursday the contract she's drawing up will ask the company that takes over the hospital to pay for the costs of making the switch.

The authority initially authorized $25,000 for the legal help, and Wednesday night added another $30,000.

The attorneys -- led by healthcare specialist Renee Montgomery at Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein -- and an outside consultant are helping the Authority to determine what the healthcare community, elected officials and residents want from their community hospital, and to steer through the maze of laws and regulations that will get them there.

Montgomery said Thursday she hopes the company that takes over Brunswick Community Hospital will pay what it is costing the hospital authority and county to finalize the deal.

She plans to include it in the contract for the transfer.

The bills include expenses for telephone calls, copying, courier service and travel expenses as well as the time members of the firm have worked on the process.

Montgomery said she and the Hospital Corporation of America, the parent company of the firm that now operates Brunswick's hospital, have agreed there is no need for a confidentiality agreement.

The agreement, which was originally proposed by Hospital Corporation of America to protect legally private information, became unnecessary when the authority agreed that negotiations for the final hospital contract would be between Hospital Corporation of America and the company proposing to take over.

With no public entity involved, there would be no question that any of the information could be a matter of public record.

The public would have access to whatever agreement might be made between the new company and the authority, assuming that the hospital is leased rather than sold. A sales contract between the county and the new company would also be public record.

-----

To see more of The Sun News, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.MyrtleBeachOnline.com.

Copyright (c) 2005, The Sun News, Myrtle Beach, S.C.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.

Source: The Sun News (Myrtle Beach, S.C.)

More News in this Category