Thirty minutes was all it took to reject two objections made by the Estes Valley Voice and pass the 2025 Estes Park Health’s $63 million budget Friday morning.
The special session of the EPH Board of Directors was called so the board would have time to consider the objections prior to adopting pertinent legal documents associated necessary to conduct business in the coming year. At least 13 members of the public attended the meeting virtually, although 20 had registered to attend.
Comments about the proposed breast imaging center made by resident Gerald Mayo at the Dec. 11 meeting received the majority of comments during the Friday morning session.
Cost for remodeling the imaging area of Estes Park Health is estimated to be $450,000, an amount authorized during the Dec. 3 special meeting. EPH anticipates $200,000 of that amount will be donated by the Estes Park Health Foundation. During Wednesday’s regular board meeting Mayo had suggested that a door lock could solve a stated issue of patients needing privacy for less money than $450,000.
“It’s an investment that will make care better,” said Vern Carda, EPH’s CEO. “It’s an investment that will make our processes more efficient.”
Defending the project, Carda said, “More importantly, it’s an investment in an advanced and a higher-level quality of healthcare inside our organization. We just need our building and our equipment to be upgraded and updated, and I think this project will do that.”
“This is a joint project between the hospital and the foundation,” said Drew Webb who serves as the vice chair of the EPH board and who is also a member of the Estes Park Hospital Foundation.
More support for incorporating the $450,000 health center remodel into the 2025 capital expenditure budget came from Steve Alper who serves as the EPH board treasurer.
“In my mind (this is) an excellent project, in addition to the partnership with the foundation. I just want to be clear that it’s this level of vetting projects that the organization goes through with a capital project,” Alper said.
Webb was clearly unhappy with Mayo’s comment that less expensive methods could be used to provide patient privacy.
“This points out some of these uneducated, offhanded comments by the public — the damage that they can do. They truly don’t understand what the project is,” said Webb.
Based on advice received by hospital attorneys, Batey concluded that written objections by the Estes Valley Voice to approving the budget “don’t appear to have any merit. That’s our law firm’s reaction to this.”
The objections Batey referred to were based on legal notifications, whether EPH had adhered to the state budget law in releasing draft budget calculations, and proper notification of the public hearing at which the budget would be discussed.
After dismissing the objections, the board members approved the budget which included a 6% increase in hospital services, 5% increase in clinic services and 5% increase in urgent care services. The budget also assumes there will be a 2.8% decrease in the physician fee schedule, although care volumes are expected to grow with the addition of podiatry, urology, and pain management services and orthopedic surgery.
Market and merit-based salary increases calculated at 4% while insurance costs are estimated to increase 9%.
Property tax receipts are expected to remain about the same as currently seen.
The official budget that will be delivered to the state shows operating revenues of $60,277,612 and operating expenses of $62,921,112. That amount does not include non-operating income such as property tax revenues of $4,306,368.
To Drew: Your resume stated you care about the EP community. I think you might want to apologize for your cruel comment,
“ This points out some of these uneducated, offhanded comments by the public — the damage that they can do. They truly don’t understand what the project is,”
It is your job to explain, sell and justify the project to the community. It is not to insult and defy the community in this manner. The meetings are intended to exchange information.
A note to past and future donors: Please consider checking in with the foundation to ensure there was not a significant misuse of your donated funds. You may be able to discuss a refund or redirection of your donation. For example, if you donated funds to a specific department or specified medical equipment, you are within your rights to view proof of purchase.
Gerald Mayo is right, this is another Estes Park Hospital boondoggle that has not been thought out. How will this “investment” generate a return? Let’s take bets on when UCHealth will do an assessment and determine that women’s health services should be consolidated in Loveland. I say it will happen before the end of 2025, right after construction on this is finished.
Gerald Mayo is right, this is another Estes Park Hospital shiney object to divert attention from poor management decisions and hostile workplace. It’s not surprising that the hostile workplace now overflows to hostility with the community.
I agree with Mayo, the money would be much better spent supporting care at Salud.
The irony that EPH didn’t have the budget to have an external firm conduct an employee satisfaction audit yet has a budget that is over 1,000x times Vern’s lie that the cost of that assessment would be 60k (absurd – google it. Multinational corporations spend 30k on these assessments for workforces of over a million people on different continents) speaks volumes.
While the merit salary increase sounds great its misleading. The last time we had one was when there was a private push to have Vern fired. Everybody who had dirt on him or had stayed quiet got a raise. I imagine it will be the same now. How could Vern even know who has succeeded at their roles? He does not come to work or listen to his managers so there is nothing for him to even base these ‘merit raises’ on.
It is as corrupt as it can possibly be at this hospital.
Perhaps the property tax revenues of $4,306,368 could be better used to fund the Salud deficit, then purchase a bus and driver to take Estes Park Residents to Loveland or Longmont for healthcare.
It is really hard to not come to the conclusion at this point that there is illegal activity occurring here. This kind of secrecy, refusal of audits, strange behavior from all in the Csuite and the Board… this all is extremely coincidental or there is financial fraud. I think lawyers will be all over the town by the time this merger is fleshed out.
The red flags that I see:
– Rotating door of CFOs, AP Managers, HR Managers
– Outing the Charity (another money position) for no conceivable reason.
– The new CFO and HR Manager both being extremely young and have under 10 years of combined experience. Easier to be manipulated, if need be
– CEO refusing to have internal satisfaction audits. Flat out lying about the costs.
– CEO implementing a policy where complaints go to HR which then go to the CEO -> hence he can hide and get lawyers involved in the situation instead of fixing it or letting it get out
– Cutting services and still losing as much, if not more money
– Extreme turnover, in a dream destination town.
– Extreme unhappiness in the workforce. Including the CEO and CNO, I can’t name a single person who is happy with the morale and working conditions inside the hospital despite working in an altruistic profession.
– Well known that the CEO does not use email. This is absurd and not normal behavior. A reasonable person would assume that this is meant to hide a paper trail, especially in a community position. Its a hospital with less than 30 beds… you’re not overwhelmed.
– A board that acts in extreme secrecy.
What are we missing here? The community is not the one acting in bad faith at this point. Step outside of the role for a second and take a look at it from our shoes. None of this makes any logical sense. At this point the community needs answers.
Tell us what the hell is going on in the hospital we pay for (for now anyway).
I also demand to know if the CEO and CNO will be receiving raises and, if so, how much.
There has been some nefarious activity at the Estes Park Health Foundation, the Guild. There has been repeated hostile behavior by one of the paid employees at the EP Guild. I have witnessed aggression, throwing donations and swearing along with passive aggressive tactics toward volunteers and employees. The environment is unsafe and harmful. The person in charge steals items for personal gain. This has been reported before but fell on deaf ears.
When trying to report this the second time, I could not find any individual to report it to. This is for the Estes Park Health Foundation, the Guild. I think again, this complaint will fall on deaf ears. No one wants to investigate this. The Foundation knows who this person is but will likely fail to take action.