The $840 million county hospital bond makes Gilroy’s hotly
contested local bonds look like child’s play.
The $840 million county hospital bond makes Gilroy’s hotly contested local bonds look like child’s play.
In addition to $187 million worth of local bonds, Gilroy voters are being asked to approve Measure A, a measure that would allow Santa Clara County to issue bonds to seismically retrofit the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center. A yes vote means that voters will take on a property tax of about $14 per $100,000 of assessed home value annually for the next 30 years, or about $60 a year or $5 a month for the average Gilroy homeowner. A no vote means the county will have to close its trauma and burn center and eliminate 272 hospital beds – about one half of the hospital.
After the 1994 Northridge earthquake closed 11 southern California hospitals, the state imposed new seismic standards without providing adequate funding for construction costs. Hospitals have five years to upgrade their facilities. If the county hospital doesn’t comply by 2013, the faulty structures will be shut down.
The bond money will be used to rebuild VMC’s seismically unsound buildings and provide $50 million to build new medical facilities in downtown San Jose.
County officials predict that the hospital will have to shut its doors to about 11,000 patients annually for lack of beds if Measure A doesn’t pass. It requires two-thirds approval from the voters.
While many private facilities were able to pay the bill to upgrade facilities out of their own pockets, the future of VMC, because it’s a county hospital, lies in the hands of the voters, said Chris Wilder, executive director of the Valley Medical Center Foundation and spokesman for the Yes on A campaign.
VMC is a level one trauma center and the only trauma center in Santa Clara County other than Stanford’s. VMC also has the only burn center in the Bay Area and is only one of two burn centers in the state north of Los Angeles. The hospital serves one in four county residents over a four year period, Wilder said *– 209,420 patients in 2007 alone.
Endorsed by various legislators, county officials and Gilroy Mayor Al Pinheiro, the measure’s biggest enemy is the economy, Wilder said.
“Measure A is the critical countywide issue on the ballot,” said Don Gage, county supervisor. “The next major earthquake could happen at any time. We can’t afford to lose even one more hospital bed in this community. It doesn’t matter where you live in Santa Clara County – at some point, you or someone you love will very likely need Valley Medical Center.”
