Sonoma Valley Health Care Coalition Meetings

More than 70 people from all sides of the recent Measure C controversy met on Monday night, June 5, at Ramekins to begin the work of the newly formed Sonoma Valley Healthcare Coalition (SVHCC). By the end of the meeting, over 60% of those attending had volunteered to serve on the committees through which the Coalition will do its work in the coming months.

“We are here to tell you that the disagreement over Measure C is formally, and finally, over” said Bob Edwards, a co-Chair of the Coalition and a leader of the former “No” campaign on Measure C. “There is no “Yes” and there is no “No” on the hospital any more. Our job now is to bring the community together around a search for the 67% solution – a plan for a health care system that provides quality care and will receive the super-majority support needed to pass it”.

Coalition co-chair Steve Pease introduced a Statement of Purpose for the Coalition that, after some debate, received unanimous support. It reads “To recommend to the Sonoma Valley Health Care District Board of Directors the scope, size and setting of an economically viable Health Care Proposal most likely to achieve at least 67% voter approval for any ballot measure required to implement it and, if the Proposal is accepted and adopted by the Board, to undertake a positive information program to encourage voter approval”.

The meeting was also attended by a number of the doctors and medical personnel from the Sonoma Valley Hospital who shared their concerns regarding the uncertainty and low morale there now in the wake of Measure C. Some expressed fears that key practitioners will decide to leave if not reassured that the community is serious about having a new hospital in the Sonoma Valley that meets State earthquake standards and delivers quality health care.

When asked by Co-Chair Edwards “How many people here want to see a new hospital here in town”, all 70 attendees voted “Yes”. Leaders of the Coalition invited hospital doctors and staff to join them in their efforts and to lend their expertise to the decision making process to come.

“However, we need to be clear that the only thing the voters are being asked to do is to pay for something” said Edwards. “We need to understand the dynamic of that, and to work toward a solution that will receive the needed support, even from the percentage of voters whose health plans take them elsewhere for general care and who may only use our hospital in a life threatening emergency”.

In support of that, committees were formed to conduct and fund an opinion survey to determine “what the voters want and what they are willing to pay for”, to review of the range of facility options provided by Plan B’s expert panel and by the community or other private groups; and to raise funding to support the SVHCC’s work.

In an intensive effort to get its work done in a timely manner, the Sonoma Valley Healthcare Coalition will meet at Ramekins from 7 to 9 every Monday night (except holidays) “until its work is done”. It is expected that one of the up-coming Monday night meetings will feature a return visit by key members of the Plan B Expert Panel to review their recommendations and to answer questions from the public and from the Coalition as their work proceeds.

Members of the public with an interest in working toward a positive outcome to the search for a sustainable health care system in the Sonoma Valley are invited to attend.

A Word From the Plan B Committee

OPTIONS FOR
HEALTH CARE
IN THE
SONOMA VALLEY

A REPORT TO THE PLAN B COMMITTEE BY THE EXPERT PANEL
Based on the proceedings of an Intensive Evaluation Workshop held at Ramekins in the City of Sonoma on April 20 and 21, 2006

Panel Members:
Jim Diaz, Principal, KMD Architects, San Francisco
Wanda Jones, President, New Century Healthcare Institute, S.F.
Craig Acosta, Principal, KSA Health Care Planning, San Bruno

Presented here is the Final Report submitted to the community in the Sonoma Valley by the Expert Panel that was commissioned by the Plan B Committee to evaluate previous assumptions, examine publicly unexamined alternatives, and suggest new concepts for a new hospital and health care system to serve the Sonoma Valley.

Download the Report (pdf)

The report is based on the information presented to the Expert Panel at an Intensive Evaluation Workshop sponsored and organized by the Plan B Committee and held at Ramekins in the City of Sonoma on April 20 & 21, 2006.

Plan B is not a plan but a process.
In the days when the Plan B Committee was being formed, the name seemed appropriate in view of the fact that Plan A (Measure C) was clearly on a course toward failure, and a “Plan B” of some kind was the next logical destination for our community. Additionally the name always gets a smile (a rare thing in the Measure C debate), and its intention is always immediately understood.

Plan B’s activities: Our activities have been, and will continue to be, geared toward a process rather than a plan, and this report is just one part of the process. Running parallel are efforts to form a coalition of leaders from both sides of the Measure C debate to enable our newly informed and awakened community to regroup and provide positive input into the decisions that need to be made soon; to reassure the doctors, nurses and staff at the hospital and invite them to work toward a positive outcome in the effort to find consensus on health care in the Sonoma Valley; and to work to involve the leadership of the Latino community in the next steps of the process.

The role of the Expert Panel has been to gather information, listen to the presentations and review the documentation presented at the Workshop, then provide the benefit of their experience in hospital design, construction and programming to develop the report presented here.

Four panelists participated in the Intensive Evaluation Workshop at Ramekins: Jim Diaz, Principal with KMD Architects, San Francisco; Wanda Jones, President, New Century Healthcare Institute in San Francisco; Craig Acosta, KSA Health Care Planning, San Bruno; and Siga Weber, Principal in Weber & Company in Glen Ellen.

Unfortunately, due to the responsibilities surrounding the death of a close family member that occurred soon after the Workshop at Ramekins, Siga had to drop out of the Panel. We regret her absence, wish her well, and thank her for her participation in the two days of the Workshop at Ramekins.

The role of the Plan B Committee has been to invite and sponsor the Panel of Experts, facilitate the Workshop, and deliver the report by the Expert Panel to the community in the Sonoma Valley and to the Board and administration of the Sonoma Valley Health Care District. The Plan B Committee wishes to make it clear from the outset that this is the Expert Panel’s report, not the Plan B Committee’s report.

The opinions expressed here are those of the Panel members and, like the public and the hospital administration, the members of the Plan B Committee may have differing opinions about their content any findings they make. The Plan B Committee looks forward to working with the community and the administration of the hospital to arrive at a course of action that is appropriate to the future of health care in the Sonoma Valley.

DISTRIBUTION
The Plan B Committee has made the following arrangements for distribution of the Expert Panel’s report:

Summary: the summary will be printed in English and included for distribution in the two local newspapers that serve the Sonoma Valley – the Sonoma Index-Tribune and the Sonoma Valley Sun. The Sun has agreed to also make an additional 1000 copies of the Summary available for further distribution.

The Summary also will be translated into Spanish for distribution to the Latino community in the Sonoma Valley through El Sol de Sonoma, the Spanish language newspaper published by the Sun.

Download The Report (PDF)

PLAN B COMMITTEE MEETS WITH COMMUNITY LEADERS RE: HOSPITAL

Sonoma, Ca, May 10, 2006:

On Monday May 8 a group of community leaders from both sides of the Measure C campaign met at the invitation of the Plan B Committee to respond to the question “Can we work together to chart the future for our hospital in the Sonoma Valley”. Among those attending the meeting at Ramekins in Sonoma were leaders of both the Yes and the No campaigns on Measure C, members of the hospital administration and the Hospital Board, doctors from the hospital and in private practice in Sonoma, and a number of concerned citizens who have been vocal in, or worked on, the recent campaigns on both sides.

“What was intended to be a small ad hoc gathering expanded into a meeting of about 35 people as more and more folks called to express an interest in participating” said Peter Haywood, Co-Chair of the Plan B Committee. “It speaks to the informed nature of the community at this time, and to the urgent desire of many to go beyond the divisiveness of the Measure C campaign and begin a period of cooperation as we consider all options in the rebuilding of our hospital”.

Leaders from the No on C campaign, however, urged that the lessons learned in the campaign be kept clearly in mind as planning goes forward toward a new hospital. Bill Boerum underlined the need to find a solution that will get the support of 67% of the voters, and called for innovative solutions to old problems and a more affordable approach that people can get behind.

Bob Edwards stressed the need to understand the new starting point at which the community has arrived, and he advocated “finding out what the people want and will support” as the first step toward a new solution to the hospital in the Sonoma Valley.

Doctors Nidorf and Galanopoulos spoke of the worries among “those working in the trenches” about the potential closure of the hospital, and of the need to respect the value of the “human capital” at the hospital and to work to minimize staff losses while time is taken to make the decisions that are needed.

“The common denominator of the meeting was "working together toward a solution" said Suzanne Brangham, a member of Plan B and one of the facilitators of the meeting. “Everyone in the room got an opportunity to speak, and they did. The result was almost 100% agreement that we want a hospital and will meet often and work in concert with one another”.

Plan B Committee Co-Chair Norman Gilroy reported that the Expert Panel’s report is nearing completion, and that arrangements have been made with the local papers, the Sonoma Index Tribune and the Sonoma Sun, to publish the Executive Summary in the week of May 15 and distribute it to their readerships throughout the Sonoma Valley. Radio KSVY has also agreed to carry the full text of the report on its web site.

Consensus was reached that the members of the Expert Panel will be invited back to discuss the report and its suggestions and findings at an open meeting in early June (date to be announced).

“It should be clear by now that Plan B is not a “plan”, said Gilroy. “Instead it is an exploration of a number of options through which we can find better ways to build a hospital that meets seismic standards, is affordable, is in the right place, and serves us for decades to come. Plan B is also the beginning of a new process that we hope will bring the people of the Sonoma Valley back together in the wake of Measure C to find a solution for our hospital that has the support of the people of the Valley”.