Today, the Larimer County Commissioners will decide whether to approve UCHealth’s acquisition of the Park Hospital District, which is set to take effect Dec. 1, 2025, 944 days after voters first authorized negotiations.
When voters approved that measure in 2023, Estes Park Health had $11 million of debt. The community feared the hospital faced imminent closure. In a community where 40% of residents are 60 years of age or older, where more than four million tourists visit annually, and where the nearest hospital is an hour away, local health care isn’t optional — it’s essential.
A legacy built by the community
Estes Park Health exists because this community built it. In 1968, voters created a special hospital district funded by property taxes. Donations—from people like Roger Knutsson, who gave $100,000 in memory of his wife Elizabeth—made the hospital possible. The Elizabeth Guild and generations of volunteers raised millions more over the decades to expand services and buy needed medical equipment.
But as healthcare economics changed, the small hospital struggled to survive. The nursing home, obstetrics, pediatrics, and home-care programs all closed. By 2023, the district sought a partner to stay afloat.
A deal gone too far
What no one expected was an unprecedented deal that would hand over all district property-tax revenue—currently $4.56 million per year—for the next 50 years to a private corporation, with no local and public oversight.
The Park Hospital District will remain only as a tax collector, forwarding public money to UCHealth, while residents lose the right to elect those who govern their tax-supported hospital.
That is tantamount to taxation without representation.
Sunshine accountability has been missing
Over the past three years, the Estes Park Health Board has held more than 150 executive session meetings, providing little transparency regarding this acquisition or other significant decisions made by this Board, including executive bonuses paid to the CEO and other administrators, or the costs of severance deals offered to recently dismissed executives.
Everything about the governance of Estes Park Health is done in secret. The Board members do not have publicly accessible email addresses, so the public can’t review the business of this Board without filing formal Colorado Open Records Act requests.
The 2026 budget has not been publicly posted. Last year, when Estes Valley Voice editors requested to review the 2025 budget, they had to make an appointment to see it. When they arrived for the appointment, they were shown a single one-page document—no schedules, no details—and told not to take notes or photos.
When asked why the hospital’s budget was being hidden, the CEO told the Estes Valley Voice it was a “best practice.” The Estes Valley Voice then filed a CORA for the one-page budget, and it was released three days later. This was a $64 million budget for a public institution funded by a property tax mill levy paid for by the property owners of the Park Hospital District.
A year ago last October, when the Estes Park Hospital Board announced it had signed a Letter of Intent with UCHealth, it refused to release the LOI to the public. In March, after three CORA requests to release the LOI, the Estes Valley Voice asked the Larimer County Court to review the matter.
Six months after the LOI was signed and days before the court date – late on the afternoon of Election Day, as voters were going to the polls to elect two new members of the Board – the Letter of Intent was suddenly released.
On July 17, Larimer County District Court Judge Carroll Michelle Brinegar ordered the taxpayer-funded hospital to pay the Voice’s legal fees and costs after it withheld the LOI.
Estes Park Health is not a private, nonprofit organization. It is a tax-funded special district – a unit of government – and its Board should act accordingly and respect the electorate by respecting the state’s Open Records and Open Meetings Laws.
What’s at stake and what is needed
Once UCHealth takes over, there are no guarantees the Estes Park facility will remain a full-service inpatient hospital. With an average daily census of just four patients, closure or conversion to an outpatient center would be easily justified.
If that happens, what becomes of the millions in local tax dollars?
The community deserves clear answers—before, not after—the deal is approved.
The Estes Valley Voice calls on the Larimer County Commissioners to pause the acquisition until a Mill Levy Stewardship Plan is developed and released to the public. Estes Valley taxpayers deserve nothing short of:
- Clear public documentation of how UCHealth will use our mill levy funds.
- A detailed annual report on services, staffing, and capital investments, and monthly financial statements clearly published on the Park Hospital District’s website.
- An oversight mechanism that reflects our community’s priorities and values.
- Clear information about how UCHealth will choose members of the Estes Valley community to sit on the new UCHealth Estes Valley Medical Center Board, which will be a private nonprofit entity not subject to public access and the State’s Sunshine Laws. The protocol needs to stipulate how Estes Valley residents can apply for this Board, or whether they will be nominated, and if so, by whom? How long will these appointed members serve, and will they be voting members?
- And a contingency plan that outlines what will happen with the tax money if UCHealth closes the inpatient hospital.
This isn’t about stopping progress
No one disputes the need for stability or the financial reality facing Estes Park Health. But this acquisition—without accountability—undermines decades of community trust.
The Estes Valley built its hospital with heart, sweat, and public money. The least we deserve now is honesty, openness, and a written commitment to steward those tax dollars in the public interest.
The Larimer County Commissioners can ensure that by requiring transparency before approval, not after it’s too late.
The public’s business must be done publicly.