Hospital, County Agree on Rent If Deal OK’D, Annual Lease Would Be $324,000 Instead of Dollar
By KAREN MAESHIRO
LANCASTER — Antelope Valley Hospital and Los Angeles County have negotiated a new lease for the Palmdale clinic that the hospital built and the county staffs.
L.A. County will now pay a market rate of $324,000 a year, rather than the nominal rent of $1 a year it had paid previously.
“It’s now going to be a regular market-rate lease. I think the renegotiated lease is fair,” county assistant administrator Tim Moore said.
The $5.8 million, two-story, 29,000-square-foot clinic was built by Antelope Valley Hospital and opened in 2002 at 40th Street East and Palmdale Boulevard.
The county occupies the first floor and operates a walk-in urgent- care clinic from 8 a.m. to midnight seven days a week, and a primary- care clinic where people are seen by appointment 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. weekdays and 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturdays.
The hospital uses the second floor, half of which was unfinished, to house an obstetrics clinic and Healthy Homes program.
Under a new 10-year agreement, the county will lease the first floor and part of the second floor to add more services. The current lease ends in September.
“The additional space will help us meet the needs of the rapidly growing area,” Moore said.
Hospital officials said they decided to ask for more money because the building is worth it.
“That building is worth $8 million. The lease was almost over,” said Ed Mirzabegian, the hospital’s chief operating officer. “They wanted to lease more area, and we told them we don’t want to renew it or we have to negotiate the lease all over. They agreed with that.”
Negotiations went on for a year. The lease now awaits approval from the county Board of Supervisors.
Under the agreement, the hospital would have to improve the second-floor space and add more spaces to the parking lot.
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