Citizens commission on health care already drawing interest

Community members are already volunteering to serve on a new citizens commission that will guide a conversation in Colorado Springs about health care and the possible sale of Memorial Health System.

It was only Wednesday that the City Council endorsed a proposal to create the nine- to 15-member panel.
By Thursday, even before the openings were advertised, the Mayor’s Office had received two resumes and letters of interest and eight phone calls from interested applicants.

“People have already jumped on the bandwagon,” Mayor Lionel Rivera said.

“I don’t think we’ll have a lack of applicants for serving on the citizens commission, and I think there’s going to be enough interest from our citizens concerning Memorial Hospital where lots of folks will turn up to town hall meetings,” he added.

Under a proposed timeline, the commission would be appointed this month or next.

City Councilman Sean Paige expressed concern about who will serve on the council-appointed commission.
During a meeting Wednesday with council members and Memorial’s Board of Trustees, Paige said there’s been a perception that council members pick what he called “their pet people” to give council members the recommendations they want.

“I don’t think that’s going to happen in this case, but I think we need to be very careful as a City Council to not appoint people who are likely to bring (preordained) conclusions or bring conclusions that some of us on council might like,” Paige said Thursday. Paige said the city shouldn’t be in the hospital business, but that he’ll keep an open mind.

“It’s just a matter of selecting people who don’t seem to have a dog in the fight, selecting people who have an open mind about the subject, truly going into it,” he said.

Rivera said council members might encourage some community members “we think might be helpful” to apply to serve on the commission. All applicants will be interviewed, and Rivera said he would do his best to appoint a “very balanced board.”

“I’m sure there’s going to be people on there who think we should sell the hospital. There will probably be people on there who have been here a long time that have used the hospital and think we should never sell it. There will be others that are probably ambivalent, but I think we’ll get a good mix,” Rivera said. “But again, their role is only to shepherd the process.”

The community conversation will give Colorado Springs the opportunity to “come up with a local solution to something that is a national problem,” said Larry McEvoy, Memorial’s CEO.

“We have a chance to think about how to build health care that really works for Colorado Springs, works for patients, works for businesses and really helps elevate the whole community to the level that I think we all seek in the future,” he said.

“That’s what this whole conversation is about. Underneath that is how should we structure Memorial, how should we craft Memorial’s ownership to meet those needs,” he said.

HOW TO APPLY:
Send resume and letter of interest to:

Marti Devine Sletta

Assistant to the Mayor

City Hall

107 N. Nevada Ave., Suite 300

Colorado Springs, CO 80901

or via e-mail to mdevine@springsgov.com

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Call the writer at 476-1623