The second August 27 special Hospital meeting began immediately after the first and was held in executive session for more than an-hour-and-a-half regarding staffing decisions. Before dismissing the press House said, “We are talking about actually two different issues with respect to personnel and the actions we are going to take — we don’t know yet.”
On June 1, commissioners entered into contract with Alliance Management Group to, among other responsibilities, manage with full authority the hospital’s human resources and personnel, including terms and conditions of employment.
The contract expressly says that the Hospital Commission (i.e., owner) “shall not interfere with the day-to-day operations of the Hospital by the Manager and shall at no time give or communicate orders or instructions to employees or personnel subject to the Manager’s direction under this agreement.”
Alliance is paid a minimum of $25,000 per month to manage day-to-day operations and hospital personnel. At the August 17 meeting, Parke said that employment applications from potential new hires for the position of Chief Nursing Officer would be provided to commissioners, and a small group of the commissioners would be involved in the interview process.
House said that commissioners’ involvement would be minimal and added, “Just to be clear on that, when we interview the commissioners won’t be together — we won’t be meeting together, just individually.” Commissioners’ involvement at new hire interviews evolved into rehire discussions at this executive session, further fading the line between hospital owner and manager.
Midway into executive session, while the press waited outside in the rain, commissioner Michael Merry arrived.
After executive session, the press was allowed to return and commissioner Barbara Dicks said, “I make a motion that we offer the employee that was terminated the position of Compliance Officer on a part-time basis.” The motion was unanimously approved.
The name of the employee was not provided but Vicki Andert was mentioned at the August 17 meeting when Parke said she had stepped down as the Chief Nursing Officer but requested to stay part-time in the capacity of Compliance Officer.
It appears Andert was terminated between August 17 and August 27 by Alliance, and at this meeting the commission voted to rehire her. The commission, by contract, is not supposed to interfere with Alliance, but in a disagreement, the commission can override Alliance with a unanimous vote.
Asked if this vote indicates that the commission has overruled the manager’s decision House responded, “…we didn’t vote to overrule and instruct them to fix it. We simply said she would be rehired.”
After the motion to rehire, Merry asked Parke why he was opposed to the motion. Parke, who is paid by commissioners to make these decisions replied, “What we are dealing with is a power struggle between two entities and you are not going to have both entities in the hospital at the same time.”
Merry asked Parke, “You don’t feel there is an alternative to compromise?”
“Not after what Jean [Commissioner Reed] said,” Parke replied.
Reed responded, “Well, what I said is I think that this is so complex and I don’t think that we’re well equipped to do an assessment of what’s going on here as an objective person…”
Reed referred to her desire to have an outside party come into the hospital who knows about hospital operations, personnel issues, and conflict resolution.
House said that his title does not allow him to vote in this instance, but regarding Dicks’s motion to rehire, he said, “So I will go on record to say, I think this is a mistake — it’s a mistake.”
On Friday, House sent the press this statement: “The vote that the hospital commission took last evening was non-binding. Due to our contract with Alliance, we can neither hire nor fire employees at the hospital. Only Alliance can do that. We can make suggestions, but we cannot take binding action. I just wanted to make sure that was clear before it gets published.”