Four Oktibbeha County supervisors indicated Wednesday they have no problem with the public knowing the identities of firms that submitted proposals to purchase or lease OCH Regional Medical Center.
But even with that admission, and in the face of a public records complaint The Dispatch filed for being denied that information, supervisors still didn’t release those details.
The Dispatch submitted its complaint to the Mississippi Ethics Commission on Wednesday asking if the Oktibbeha County Board of Supervisors violated the state public records act by refusing to release the number of proposals it received for the county-owned hospital in Starkville, as well as the suitors’ identities. After supervisors met in executive session on Sept. 26 to review the proposals, they said confidentiality agreements prevented them from releasing any specifics until after a Nov. 7 election where voters will decide whether to authorize a hospital sale.
The Dispatch is challenging whether supervisors can enter confidentiality agreements to protect information that would otherwise be open to the public.
“We have those agreements in place … but I hope the (ethics commission) ruling is that we have to release the information,” District 1 Supervisor John Montgomery said. “If there is an avenue we can legally release it, I’m all for it because it would be a shame if people didn’t get what they needed to make an informed decision on this vote.”
Supervisor Marvell Howard, who represents District 3 and is hosting a town hall meeting at 6 p.m. today at the courthouse to further discuss a possible OCH transaction, agrees with Montgomery’s position. Still, he said he isn’t willing to break confidentiality.
“I don’t have any problem with the (public records) complaint being filed,” he said. “If there is a possibility more information can be released to the public, that’s a good thing.”
Both Montgomery and Howard have consistently voted against efforts to pursue a hospital sale or lease.
The ethics commission cannot compel a public entity to release records, but it can rule on whether there has been a legal violation. After the commission issues its preliminary ruling, parties can appeal it and ultimately bring it into the court system.
Miller seeks waiver of confidentiality
However, supervisors Orlando Trainer and Bricklee Miller — who represent districts 2 and 4, respectively, and have consistently voted alongside District 5 Supervisor Joe Williams to pursue an OCH transaction — said they don’t believe the complaint process will get that far.
Miller said she has asked consultant Ted Woodrell, whom supervisors hired to help shepherd them through the process of a hospital study and obtaining proposals, to see if bidders would waive the confidentiality agreements to the extent supervisors can at least release their identities.
“It’s better for them to do it than for us to do it at this point,” Trainer agreed, referring to bidders giving consent to release more information.
State law allows supervisors to protect the content of the proposals at least until a notice of intent to award a bid is issued, which cannot happen until after the election. But both Trainer and Miller said there would be more negotiations with bidders if the board earned voter permission to sale or lease OCH.
In the meantime, the board claims all elements of those proposals — including bidder identities — are part of a competitive bidding process and therefore sealed, another point The Dispatch has challenged.
On Wednesday, Trainer at first defended the proposals are still considered “sealed,” although supervisors opened and reviewed them. Then he said they were “not sealed” anymore.
“That was prior to the review, I guess (that they were sealed),” he said.
The Dispatch could not reach Williams for comment.
OCH response, supervisor accusations
OCH CEO Richard Hilton said it would help the voters and hospital leadership if they knew who the bidders are.
The only indication Hilton has, he said, are from two site visits to OCH during the summer — one from a consultant of the Mississippi-based Horne Group who wouldn’t say what medical system he represented; and another from a group of 10 representatives of Memphis-based Baptist Health Systems.
“To me, knowing what systems are bidding enables me to know what to expect if the hospital is indeed sold,” Hilton said. “The culture and philosophy a system has on how they manage community hospitals tells you a lot.”
Trainer and Miller, though, said they believe Hilton’s calls for transparency are hollow.
Supervisors earlier this year ordered OCH to compile information in a digital data room for potential bidders to access. Among other things, the data room was to include information about the hospital’s finances, contracts, organizational structure, as well as OCH board of trustees meeting minutes.
While trustees had already indicated OCH would not provide bidders information they deemed private — such as contracts for which they had signed confidentiality agreements and things protected by federal patient privacy laws — Hilton said OCH provided roughly 96 percent of what the county requested.
Trainer and Miller called that number “questionable.”
In fact, Miller said bidders told her that of the 201 items OCH was asked to provide, as many as 70 were “either missing or so heavily redacted they were unusable.”
“That’s a lot of the reason we’ll have to go back and negotiate after the election (if voters authorize a sell),” Miller said. “(OCH was) not compliant with providing the required information. That’s driving up the cost for everybody and delaying the process.”
Hilton said he doesn’t know what Miller is talking about.
First, his records show the hospital provided 214 of 224 items requested, though he admitted content from some of those items was redacted to protect confidentiality and privacy. Further, he said, OCH never received any indication the information it provided was insufficient for potential bidders.
“I think it’s interesting that’s being said after the proposals have been opened,” Hilton said. “If (the firms) didn’t have sufficient information to bid, then what did they submit to the supervisors?”
He added if a sale ultimately went through, OCH would provide much of the redacted or missing information to the winning bidder before closing the transaction. If done before then, he said, the losing bidders could even walk off with OCH’s sensitive information.
Hilton also noted he and his staff spent a combined 874 hours compiling information for the data room between May 1 and Sept. 11, making Miller’s claims of non-cooperation that much more offensive.
“If we were dragging our feet and not complying, would we have consumed that many man hours?” he asked.
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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