Valley Hospital election ballots out

The Valley Hospital Association annual election is underway, and this year VHA mailed 1,773 ballots to residents who signed up and paid $5 to join VHA.

The 2002 election could more than double the number of voters from last year if all of the ballots are returned. There seems to be a growing interest in the hospital administration that has been sustained for two years. In 2000, 526 members were eligible to vote and 353 ballots were ultimately counted. In 2001, 932 members were eligible to vote, and 691 ballots were ultimately counted. Last year's election reversed a seven-year trend in falling VHA membership.

Besides the day-to-operations, VHA -- and it's new leaders -- are facing two big issues: the need to build a new hospital and the need for a large capital partner. Both of these issues have been identified for years and listed as reasons to vote by hospital CEO George Larson. In public presentations Larson has said that VHA requires a minimum of 80 acres to build a campus that can meet the area's growth over the next three decades. Larson has also said 200 acres would be better.

VHA members are being asked to elect five people to fill vacancies on the 15-member VHA association board. The association board does not set corporate policy. Its main job is to select appointees to serve on VHA's operating board, which has the power and responsibility to establish policies for the corporation.

Larson said earlier this week that the current operating board hasn't made specific decisions on either the geography or capital partnership issues. He has recommended that the operating board hold those decisions until after new board members are seated.

"We don't want [new board members] to come in and feel uninformed," Larson said.

Larson also said he hasn't made specific recommendations to the operating board yet either.

"We're keeping [board members] informed as to who the potential capital partners are," Larson said, "We're also working with the federal government and the state government to see what sort of funding is available."

So far, at least four potential corporate partners have been in talks with VHA -- two are nonprofit and two are for profit. The nonprofits are Providence Alaska and PeaceHealth, which is based in Eugene, Ore., and runs Ketchikan General Hospital and other hospitals in the Pacific Northwest founded by the Sisters of St. Joseph. The for-profit corporations that have courted VHA are LifePoint Hospitals Inc. and Community Health Systems Inc. Both companies are based in Brentwood, Tenn., and both specialize in non-urban hospitals.

Nine candidates appear on the VHA ballot. They are Stanley Tucker, Karen Vosburgh, Helen Woodings, Sally Anderson, Janice Barrett, Vincent Curry, Paula Harrison, Deborah Prator and Mariann Stoffel. Each of the five seats available is open for a three-year term.

The association board is responsible for selecting eight of nine operating board seats. The other operating board seat is filled by a physician elected by all of the physicians with hospital privileges at Valley Hospital.

Until last year, there was only one seat reserved for a staff physician, but in an effort to increase the influence of medical professionals on hospital policy, VHA adopted bylaw changes that added two more seats reserved for physicians.

Completed ballots must be received at the post office box designated in the ballot mailing by 5:30 p.m. on June 3. The election committee cannot accept ballots that are dropped off at any hospital property -- ballots must be received via the designated post office box only. Results of the election will be announced at the VHA annual meeting on June 10 at the Valley Hospital Medical Center in Wasilla.

The association board will meet one more time in June to ratify the election, seat the new association board members and select from a list of candidates to fill three operating board seats. Two of the operating board seats are open for complete five-year terms. One is a seat reserved for an association board member, the other is open to any member at-large.

The third operating board seat is reserved for a member of the association board who will be appointed to fill a seat for the last year of a five-year term. That seat was vacated by Randy Westbrook, whose resignation was accepted in March.