Our Town

Let’s hope few RTM members buy the argument that a “no” vote on the $20.2 million bonding proposal for Project Renew is good for Nathaniel Witherell. Contrary to Budget Overview Committee Chairman Bill Drake’s assertions on the op-ed page of today’s (Sunday, December 11, 2011) Greenwich Time, a “no” vote Monday night will in fact herald an end to this town treasure.

The proposed renovations are critical to the nursing home’s future. And the time to move forward is now. In all likelihood, there will not be another such opportunity.

In the words of Bob Richardson, who chaired the RTM’s special committee on Nathaniel Witherell: ” This is our last bite of the apple. We will not get another chance.”

Richardson was among the thirty-five people who spoke at the BET’s October 17 public hearing on Project Renew. All but four of the speakers voiced overwhelming support for the project. Drake was one of the very few naysayers.

As Drake points out in his op-ed article, the nursing home loses money on its Medicaid residents. It is, therefore, essential that Nathaniel Witherell maintain a healthy residential mix that includes a significant number of long-term private pay residents as well as short-term rehab patients. These revenues are critical.

Unless the Project Renew physical upgrade is undertaken, Nathaniel Witherell will not remain competitive with other area facilities in attracting the private pay residents and rehab patients that are essential to its long-term economic viability.

Nathaniel Witherell now has the required Certificate of Need from the state. It has a realistic business plan and is ready to move forward. This renovation project consists of very basic improvements to the physical plant that will keep the facility competitive. It is much scaled down from earlier proposals.

The proposal now before the RTM represents the culmination of a process that began nine years ago, in 2002. During this long journey, every aspect of Nathaniel Witherell operations have come under intense town scrutiny, including by the RTM’s own special committee chaired by Richardson.

In April 2007, the RTM voted overwhelmingly to give Nathaniel Witherell the go ahead to renovate as a town-owned facility. It was agreed that any change in governance, such as turning the town-owned nursing home into a not-for-profit entity, could be considered at some future date after the renovation, if warranted.

Following that overwhelming RTM vote, the Nathaniel Witherell board proceeded in good faith with plans for Project Renew.

The RTM has already thoroughly aired and discussed the governance issue, and voted on it. Tomorrow night’s vote should not be about re-visiting that 2007 vote. But Drake’s argument brings it in by the back door, or maybe by a side door.

While Drake finds that a “no” vote will allow for other capital projects that he feels should be higher in the town’s order of priority – a legitimate point of view in making an individual decision to vote against the bonding proposal –  the most significant and desired consequence of a “no” vote in his view will be to get the town out of the nursing home business.

A “no” vote, according to Drake, is the only way to set in motion a process that will force Nathaniel Witherell to privatize and become a not-for-profit entity that he would like to see modeled after Greenwich Hospital.

In some magical unexplained way, such change in ownership is supposed to result in a different business plan that will lead to the nursing home’s greater financial viability and long-term sustainability.

How that business plan would differ from the current one is unclear. Also, there is no compelling reason to believe that the creation of a new, as-yet undefined, entity will serve the town, or the residents of Nathaniel Witherell, better than does the current five-star rated and highly praised town-owned facility that we all know and love.

What is clear is that a “no” vote will bring everything to a grinding halt, send everyone back to the drawing board and set the stage for Nathaniel Witherell’s probable downward spiral, ultimately at far greater cost to the town.

Would the town choose to go into the nursing home business today if it did not already own a nursing home? Of course not.

But the fact is that in 1903 Robert Bruce, a great benefactor to our town, conveyed to the Town of Greenwich nine acres of land with four buildings on Parsonage Road. This property was conveyed to the town to serve as a municipal hospital for contagious diseases, and the property is deed restricted for this hospital purpose.

In 1912, Mrs. Nathaniel Witherell donated funds to build a town Tuberculosis pavilion on the Parsonage Road property. Originally known as the Greenwich General Hospital, the Parsonage Road facility was later known as the Municipal Hospital as distinct from the Greenwich Hospital.

What we know as Greenwich Hospital opened at its original location on Milbank Avenue in 1906, and was then known as the Milbank Avenue Hospital. It later moved to its current location on Perryridge Road, where it opened its doors in the autumn of 1917. Greenwich Hospital, from the beginning a private nonprofit entity, has its origins with the formation of the The Greenwich Hospital Association in March 1903.

Nathaniel Witherell, with origins also in 1903, is located on deed-restricted property that Robert Bruce donated to the town, and has a public sector history, in contrast to Greenwich Hospital.

Under the town’s stewardship, the Bruce and Witherell legacies have proven to be of immeasurable benefit to Greenwich residents. The Nathaniel Witherell is an outstanding, first class nursing home. Only a “yes” vote will preserve this precious legacy.