After months of planning and discussion, local leaders in a northwestern Tennessee community have agreed on a course of action to keep its hospital in operation.
Henry County commissioners on Monday agreed to lease Henry County Medical Center to West Tennessee Healthcare in an effort to preserve access to healthcare for local residents due to a lack of alternatives in the area.
Under the agreement – which the county board of commissioners passed 9-5 – WTH’s lease payments over the next 25 years will be used to pay off HCMC’s nearly $25 million bond debt. At the end of the lease agreement, the county would have the option to buy back the health center from WTH. The Paris-based hospital would also be renamed to West Tennessee Healthcare Henry County.
The healthcare organization also agreed to provide hospital-level services – such as inpatient care and surgeries – for at least 10 years, and healthcare services in the northwest Tennessee county for 40 years.
One of the services that could not be guaranteed in the agreement was the restoration of HCMC’s obstetrics services, which the hospital shut down last year due to costs.
Bruce Reed, chair of the HCMC Board of Trustees, said leasing the hospital to the Jackson, Tennessee-based healthcare group was “the best deal we got on the table” to keep the medical center operating.
“Prior to COVID, this hospital was out of money, it was broke. And this administration, after COVID, has found ways to keep it open to get to this point to survive,” Reed told the county commissioners. “We've got a great hospital, it's only gonna be better because they're going to be able to offer things we can’t.”
After the sale of Henry County Healthcare Center earlier this year, Reed said the hospital had about $10 million in cash on hand. The medical center board chair said according to projections, that money would have only lasted through the end of October before running out.
During the county meeting’s public comments section, some residents – including Henry County mayor candidate Randy Geiger – advocated for the commissioners to table the lease agreement to give the county officials more time to review and consider the terms. According to the Paris Post-Intelligencer, commissioners received copies of the proposed lease agreement in mid-July.
Angela Humpreys, an attorney who has been representing HCMC and Henry County during negotiations with WTH, told commissioners that delaying the signing of the agreement would have pushed back the closing date for any deal to closer to the end of this year or early next year.
Henry County Commissioner Jay Travis said he did not want to wait any longer to approve the deal. He said waiting to take care of problems has caused issues for the county before, such as waiting to do repairs on aging county-owned infrastructure.
“I don't think we need to keep kicking this down the road, like we've done all these buildings that we've got to come back to, and wait for some knight in shining armor to walk through that door,” Travis said.
The 25-year deal with WTH, which also needs to be approved by the state attorney general’s office, is expected to close around Oct. 1.
