Letters to the Editor

No on F was
right vote

Editor: When will it stop? How many millions of dollars will the tax payers of Sonoma be asked to shell out to bail out the hospital? How many millions of dollars has the hospital spent (wasted) on architectural drawings and revisions of drawings for a hospital that the community voted down 2½ years ago?
How long did the Hospital Board lead this community to believe they were going to build on Broadway, and how many thousands of dollars did they spend in nonrefundable negotiations fees with the people who own those properties?
In 2003, a five-year parcel tax cost the property owners of the Sonoma Hospital District ten million dollars. In 2007 the Board again asked for a new fiv- year parcel tax, this time for fifteen million. Where has all this money gone? What do we have to show for our tax dollars?
Bond Measure F was asking the tax payers of Sonoma Valley Hospital District for an additional forty-five million. The voter’s pamphlet says that this money will be used for retention and recruitment of doctors and specialists, operating costs, and facilities. We thought that was what the five-year tax of fifteen million was for. It also states they will buy the Carinalli property. Presently, that land is zoned residential. It takes at least two years to change such zoning, assuming that the EIR is clean and the neighborhood doesn’t fight it.
Had the hospital taken all the money it has recently spent on architects, drawing, studies, special elections, and negotiations with property owners and put it into the hospital, we would have a state of the art facility right now.
Voting No on F didn’t mean you are against the hospital here in Sonoma. It does mean you did not want to be obligated to pay its bills. They won’t stop with this forty-five million. What would they have asked for next?
Michele and Renee Jourdain
Sonoma

Editor: It is 11:10 p.m. and I have reloaded my screen to see what can be considered a disastrous result. Only 46.6 percent of the registered voters cast their opinion on Measure F. Did the other 33.4 percent (we normally have 80+ percent vote) not care? Will we be able to reach another emergency room in time? Will another emergency room have room for us? How far will we need to travel for a doctor who can admit us to a hospital in which they can practice? Will there be doctors who have room in their practices for Medicare patients? Although we needed to have a parcel tax to keep the doors open, they were open. For 12 years, the community had battled on the location of a new hospital. A hospital which would have attracted the doctors and staff that we needed for the future. Now we will travel further for health care services which we had minutes away? 501 votes cast as yes instead of no and my life could have been saved.
Stanley Cohen
Sonoma