BRUNSWICK
Eight months after Central Maine Healthcare Inc. last asked a state licensing agency to suspend its request to take over operation of Parkview Adventist Medical Center, the Lewiston based hospital group has withdrawn its application from the state’s consideration.
Chuck Gill, CMHC’s president, said Tuesday he withdrew the application because the state’s Department of Licensing and Regulation had “accelerated its deadline” by six months, leaving the hospital without enough time to compile data to support its bid.
Phyllis Powell, assistant director of the agency, disagreed.
“We didn’t really accelerate the process, we continued it,” Powell said. “We looked at various correspondence we had received from (CMHC) and decided to bring that project back under review, so we activated the Certificate of Need (process).”
After providing varying degrees of financial and staffing support to the smaller of Brunswick’s two hospitals since 2002, CMHC formally petitioned the state’s Department of Health and Human Services to take over management of Parkview in late summer 2012.
Mid Coast Hospital launched an identical effort immediately after the CMHC filing. However, its application was rejected because the two competitive reviews could not be concurrently considered.
After the state notified CMHC in January that its application was incomplete and would be rejected, the health care group decided in February to suspend its application until it could submit the missing information.
By suspending the certificate review CMHC, the parent group of Central Maine Medical Center, planned to have up to a year to finalize the application.
However, during the summer, DHHS and DLR personnel “re-reviewed the records based on additional information CMHC sent,” Powell said.
That’s why the state’s unexpected resumption of the review process caught Gill off guard.
“We had a year in February, but now it’s six months,” Gill said. “Six months is not a year. It’s that simple.
“I have no idea why they did it. But they did it, the application is withdrawn, and it’s a new day. So we’ll move forward from here.”
Gill said he intends to restart the certificate of need process, although he did not specify when.
Michael Poulin, a CMHC attorney, said hostility by the state was the reason for the withdrawal. He called the department’s plan to reactivate the application early “plainly illegal.”
Correspondence obtained by The Times Record shows negotiations regarding the review of CMHC’s application began deteroriating this summer, after the state tried to investigate CMHC’s purchase and-sale agreements to acquire Parkview property, which the state said was prohibited.
CMHC and Parkview declined the state’s request for more information about the agreements, which the state says are disallowed during a certificate of need review.
In a July 17 letter to attorneys for CMHC, the state replied to assertions it had “fallen for the fabricated demands of Mid Coast (Hospital) to once again request a review of a relationship that has been reviewed more than once in the past and found to not be in violation of any law.”
“This is patently untrue,” wrote Ken Albert, director of the Division of Licensing and Regulatory Services for the state Department of Health and Human Services. “Though the state has clearly been involved in the relationship between CMHC and Parkview in one form or another over the last few years, the full analysis of acquisition of ownership and control required for a (certificate of need) waiver has never been completed.
“Further, the suggestion that (DHHS) is somehow a puppet to Mid Coast Hospital is insulting at best.”
In Brunswick, Randee Reynolds, president and chief executive officer of Parkview, said the withdrawal would have no noticeable day-to-day effect on the 55-bed hospital.
“For five years, we’ve been in the management contract with Central Maine Healthcare,” he said. “We’re still operating the hospital as always, the board (of directors) is still in place.”
jtleonard@timesrecord.com
The Times Record Sustaining Sponsor
We believe a community must be informed to thrive. bowdoin.edu
Comments are not available on this story. Read more about why we allow commenting on some stories and not on others.
We believe it's important to offer commenting on certain stories as a benefit to our readers. At its best, our comments sections can be a productive platform for readers to engage with our journalism, offer thoughts on coverage and issues, and drive conversation in a respectful, solutions-based way. It's a form of open discourse that can be useful to our community, public officials, journalists and others.
We do not enable comments on everything — exceptions include most crime stories, and coverage involving personal tragedy or sensitive issues that invite personal attacks instead of thoughtful discussion.
You can read more here about our commenting policy and terms of use. More information is also found on our FAQs.
Show less