The hospital issues boils to one issue, money. If you are OK with an additional sales tax, vote yes. If you think there are better funding alternatives that won’t raise your existing taxes, vote no.
My biggest what-if is what if the hospital doesn’t make the yearly profit for the 30-year term of the bond payments? Lots of factors will affect those profits as pointed out by Bob Johnson in an earlier Iola Register report. Can anyone guarantee that an actual profit will be made? Can anyone guarantee that by providing a place with new glass and bricks will actually in-crease the market share or improve patient care or attract a new doctor or two? The answer is no.
We have been overwhelmed with signs and ads touting the hospital made $1.5 million last year. That’s wonderful and congrats for a great year but why are we not hearing about the year before or the year before or the year before. I’m not willing to commit to 30 years of indebtedness on one year’s profit and loss statement. Are you?
I’ve been told that HCA manages over 20 percent of all hospital beds in the United States. Do you think our locally appointed Board of Trustees would have that level of expertise?
Join me and a number of other local concerned citizens and business owners who are opposed to this issue in its current form. Vote no and give the commissioners time to study, learn and listen to the citizens and get this very important issue right the first time. Don’t be pressured and don’t be scared, a no vote won’t close the hospital Nov. 3.
Jim Talkington,
Iola, Kan.
Editor’s note: Jim bases the funding of a new hospital on profits, only. There are three legs to funding the new hospital. One is hospital profits. The $1.5 million in profits at ACH is based on a five-year average of the hospital’s most recent performance.
The other two legs are (1) Medicare reimbursements at about $767,000 a year, and (2) the sales tax revenues from Iola and Allen County at $750,000 a year.
Combined, these sources of revenue are in excess of what is needed to make the annual payment, building up reserves for that “rainy day” if, perchance, the hospital experiences a “down” year.
No other methods of funding have been identified at this time.
