Hospital tries to mitigate

“This institution is a vital part of this community,” said Dr. Richard Kirk, Chair of the Board of Directors, Sonoma Valley Health Care District, explaining his commitment to the new hospital project. He is also committed to the community it will benefit, including those who fear for their property values. “I want to engage in dialogue with neighbors about appropriate mitigation and understanding their concerns [and] what they see as fairness,” he said, since there is no other viable alternative site. “I think we’ve got what we’ve got,” he said, “and I don’t think there’s going to be any other land search.”
Bob Rice, communications director for the hospital, reiterated the hospital’s understanding of neighbors’ concerns. “I don’t think anyone working on this project doesn’t realize that these people are talking about their security. It’s their home. For a lot of people, it’s their retirement; it’s their single biggest investment.”
In appreciation of that, the hospital has spent considerable time working to create a solution that works for the community without damaging the immediate neighborhood. “I don’t know how many hundreds of hours we put into public meetings,” said Kirk, acknowledging that even with the extensive number of meetings, some objections remain. “When it is ‘in my backyard,’ that happens,” he said, “and unfortunately, the location and the land choosing began to be like a sinkhole or magnet for everybody’s attention. I think one of the things that [hospital CEO] Carl Gerlach has done that has been so incredibly helpful was to do the ‘both/and:’ we need to have a site and need to plan for the future, but we need to make the business work now. And if we don’t make the business work now, it won’t matter where we build in the future.”
At the public meeting in the hospital cafe last week, the hospital presented to the community the new concept design. Changes included the elimination of a multi-story parking garage, some alteration of roof lines, and landscaping that will soften the visual impact of the building. There will be no helicopter pad, and general building noise, such as a “hum” originating from an old power plant, which one neighbor objected to in the current building, will not occur.
“It’s not a block house, by any means,” said Bill Boerum, a hospital board member who was part of the “Charrette” process—a kind of intense professional task force, in this case of engineers and architects, enlisted to solve a particular problem. “The leaders in that process were at a meeting where the neighbors had expressed their concerns,” said Boerum, “so they didn’t have to hear it from us; they heard it from them.” The resulting new design is considerably softened. “I see this really as a neighborhood improvement,” said Boerum, pointing out that building the hospital on the selected site will not destroy, cut down or damage anything. “It’s not an open space district. It’s just flat, vacant land.”
For those neighbors who have expressed the feeling that they have not been included in the process (a spokesperson was invited to comment for this piece but did not reply) there will be ample opportunity to do so as this process moves forward. And it must move forward, said Boerum, “We can’t not build it there. This has been going on for 10 years. Costs continue to escalate at least 10% a year, and time is running out and we have to get on with things.” Neighbors will be included every step in the way. “There are going to be many opportunities in public forums for them to voice their concerns with respect to the project in general or with respect to their own neighborhood,” said Boerum, “so every bit of due process and due diligence will be afforded to them.”