Nursing-home lease extended

Nursing-home lease extended

January 15, 2002

By Aspen C. Emmett
Journal Staff Writer

After days of negotiations between the Montezuma County Hospital District and Continuum LLC, it appears that the Vista Grande nursing home isn’t going to undergo any major changes in management, nor will there be any new buildings popping up in the near future.

Late Friday afternoon the MCHD board and representatives of the private company unanimously agreed that a five-year extension of the current system is the best option for the time being.

"Basically all they did is extend the contract for five years with no obligation of either party to build a new nursing home but allowing for that to happen from each party," said Bob Peterson, CEO of Southwest Memorial Hospital.

"There was an increase in the food cost and some of the internal agreements, but those are all secondary."

Continuum is the current lessor of the 76-bed nursing home and will remain so for the next five years, regardless of whether MCHD, Continuum or another company comes in and builds a new nursing home.

"Continuum would have to come in and re-negotiate a new lease if they were to come in and build a new nursing home. So there’s a lot of flexibility and the boards will decide what’s in the best interest in the community," Peterson said Monday.

The negotiations followed years of uncertainty as to what would happen when the original lease agreement ran out. In December the MCHD board and Continuum reached an apparent impasse on negotiations for a new ground lease.

For three years Continuum and the district were negotiating a new lease agreement.

Continuum has managed Vista Grande for profit since 1994 under a lease with the district that stipulated two options at the end of the term — negotiating a new, long-term lease at the current building on the hospital campus, or building a new home on district-owned land with an accompanying long-term ground lease.

The company and the district chose a new long-term care facility, which Continuum was to construct and then operate.

Southwest had then planned to move non-medical departments into the current Vista Grande facility to make room for hospital improvements.

"It was getting down to the wire," Peterson said. "There was difficulty agreeing on the provisions of the land lease and since they couldn’t come to agreement, this is what they did. I think this is probably the best outcome we could come up with."

Peterson said there will be some immediate changes such as aesthetic upgrades of the nursing home because of the potential the building will be in use for the next five years.

"We’ll be doing some carpeting, wall and furniture changes and the hospital will pay for that," he said.

Peterson said that a mediator was brought in to help in the negotiations and the boards are satisfied with the outcome.

"I think the two boards working together is always a good thing and they’ve been working together exceptionally well."

Journal staff writer Jim Mimiaga contributed to this report.