PATA History Pages

New Hospital possible near Hill-Diley

Joint Venture between Fairfield Medical and Mt. Carmel

Deal for medical center near

By CARL BURNETT JR., n INSIDE: Read about FMC's, finances on page 2A.
The Eagle-Gazette Staff

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LANCASTER -- Fairfield Medical Center is moving closer to cementing a partnership with Mount Carmel Health System for a new medical center in northern Fairfield County.

But specific details of the arrangement have yet to be hammered out.

At the State of the Center meeting Thursday, Mina Ubbing, president and CEO of Fairfield Medical Center, said FMC had dropped its land option on a site at Allen Road and U.S. 33. That was a proposed site for the center.

"Mount Carmel has property near the interchange at Hill-Diley Road (on U.S. 33), and we are looking closely at that," Ubbing said. "We have agreed to have a 30 percent stake in the new venture."

Ubbing said the two medical systems have narrowed down a search of companies that will conduct a feasibility study on what medical services are needed in the area.

"One of the problems we have in picking a company to do the feasibility study (is) it has to be one with no connection to either of our organizations," Ubbing said. "We are down to three companies, and they are being interviewed."

Ubbing said the study could take up to three months.

The two medical systems have been talking for a year about building a joint hospital.

The negotiations are a turnaround from 2002, when the hospitals were locked in a battle over a proposed hospital Mount Carmel wanted to build at the intersection of Coonpath Road and U.S. 33.

Fairfield Medical Center opposed the construction, saying it would have taken patients, jobs and revenue away from the Lancaster-based hospital.

The matter was settled in 2002 when Fairfield County Common Pleas Judge John Clark ordered an injunction preventing Mount Carmel from building the 50-bed hospital.

The judge ruled the construction of the hospital would have been a violation of a noncompetition clause between Mount Carmel and River View Surgery Center on U.S. 33 near the intersection of Ety Road.

The ruling ended the public relations battle between FMC and Columbus-based Mount Carmel.

Ubbing said the proposed medical complex would be non-profit.

Any final joint-operating agreement between the two hospitals must be approved by the hospital boards and the board of Mount Carmel's parent company, Trinity Health.

"To this date, I've seen nothing that would stand in the way of an agreement," Ubbing said.

Originally published Friday, April 2, 2004

New Hospital

Lancaster Eagle Gazette