{"id":36283,"date":"2023-01-16T18:08:00","date_gmt":"2023-01-17T01:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/southwest-memorial-hospital-upgrades-on-hold\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T08:30:17","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:30:17","slug":"southwest-memorial-hospital-upgrades-on-hold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/southwest-memorial-hospital-upgrades-on-hold\/","title":{"rendered":"Southwest Memorial Hospital upgrades on hold"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Southwest
Southwest Memorial Hospital offers a strong diabetes education program. (Photo by Southwest Health System)<\/span>Southwest Health System<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Voter-approved upgrades at Southwest Memorial Hospital are on hold because interest rates are too high.<\/p>\n

In May, voters approved a ballot measure to drop a sunset provision on a .04% sales tax levied by the Montezuma County Hospital District. The sales tax was approved by voters in 2015 and had been set to sunset in 2030.<\/p>\n

The approved ballot measure allows the hospital district to restructure its bond debt to finance $23 million in hospital improvements.<\/p>\n

It specifically requires the funding be used for a new emergency department, remodel of the surgery center, and for other infrastructure upgrades and maintenance.<\/p>\n

However, to move forward with the refinancing and construction projects, interest rates must be 5% or lower, as required by the ballot measure.<\/p>\n

Currently, the necessary rate is not available, said MCHD Chairman Dean Mathews, causing the projects to be on hold.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re ready to go with the plans, but we are waiting for interest rates to drop so we can refinance, then we can move forward with construction,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Currently interests rates are above five percent, and may continue to rise, he said.<\/p>\n

The hope had been to secure the bond refinancing and begin construction and upgrades soon after the May 3 election. But the district has been forced to wait until interest rates drop, and it is not clear when that will happen, Mathews said.<\/p>\n

The restructured debt, backed up by a permanent sales tax, would free up about $23 million in additional lending for the upgrades.<\/p>\n

A new $10 million emergency department building will be built to the north of the current facility. Construction is expected to be 12 to 18 months.<\/p>\n

The surgery department would be remodeled and expanded into the current emergency department space at a cost of $3 million to $4 million. Construction would take 6 to 8 months.<\/p>\n

Meeting the demand for surgery suites is a critical revenue source for the hospital, Mathews said.<\/p>\n

Infrastructure upgrades and maintenance needs at the hospital \u2013 estimated to cost between $6 million and $8 million \u2013 will also be paid for through the refinancing plan.<\/p>\n

Those projects include upgrades to the physical plant, roofing units, boiler replacement, backup generator system, HVAC, electrical systems.<\/p>\n

As a result of the approved ballot measure, the hospital will restructure its $32 million bond debt to $55 million over a term not to exceed 40 years, through the issue of revenue bonds backed by the sales tax.<\/p>\n

As part of the ballot measure, in exchange for dropping the sales tax sunset, the MCHD property tax mill levy was permanently lowered by 25% to 0.7445 mills from 0.994 mills.<\/p>\n

The mill levy reduction would be permanent. Over the next eight years, it would save property owners and estimated $1.1 million.<\/p>\n

Referendum 6A passed 55% to 45% with 1,960 voting yes and 1,623 voting no.<\/p>\n

jmimiaga@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

interest rates delay $23 million in projects, including new emergency department and expanded surgery suites<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16232,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,28,61,29,538],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-36283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cortez","tag-headlines","tag-health","tag-newsletter","tag-southwest-memorial-hospital"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36283"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83290,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36283\/revisions\/83290"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36283"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=36283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}