Hospital's Directors to Take Wait-and-See Approach on Offer
Posted on: Thursday, 1 December 2005, 18:00 CST
By Miguel Gonzalez, Daily Press, Victorville, Calif.
Dec. 1--VICTORVILLE -- The Board of Directors of the Victor Valley Community Hospital decided to take a wait-and-see approach Wednesday night to an acquisition proposal by Desert Valley Medical Center owner Dr. Prem Reddy.
In a letter sent on Oct. 28, Reddy offered the board to take over the hospital for a price of $5 million to $10 million and make improvements and pay debts with an investment of $26 million. The plan would also include the $6 million debt the hospital has with the state of California.
Board Chairman Herb Williamson said late Wednesday night that the issue was discussed in the almost four-hour meeting, but the board decided to put the subject on hold after a series of questions were brought up in closed-session.
"We discussed the letter at some length and talked about some parts of the offer," he said. "This is probably going to be an ongoing discussion and there is no timeline to answer the letter."
Despite having no timeline set, the board has scheduled at least one meeting for December. This is a rare occurrence for a board that usually has their last meeting of the year in November.
"There is a board meeting in December. I am not sure if everybody (on the board) will be able to make it, but there are a lot of decisions to be made," Board Member Jim Cox said.
Cox directed all additional questions to Williamson, a local public defender.
In the past, Reddy's offers had been rejected, most of the time without even an answer from the board. Before the meeting, some members of the board thought this was an offer too serious to ignore and that might explain the scheduling of at least one more meeting in December.
VVCH is currently in a multi-year contract with management company Physicians Hospital Management.
As of 10:30 p.m. Wednesday night, Desert Valley staff did not return an inquiry from the Daily Press. However Chief Financial Officer Roger Krissman said recently that Dr. Reddy does not have any intention of creating a monopoly of hospitals in the Victor Valley.
"The state would not allow something like that. We just don't want hospitals closing their doors, especially with the increase of population."
In April 2003 the Victor Valley hospital board of directors voted unanimously to reject Reddy's offer to buy the nonprofit hospital for $7 million.
Williamson would not specify the questions the board had about the offer but confirmed that the board had decided it did not want to reject the proposal.
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Source: Daily Press - Victorville, California
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