County Commissioners approve 2 UMC board members

We want them to grow. We want the capacity to grow. As long as we are all headed in the same strategic direction, we will be great.” nearly a month since el paso’s county judge optimistically spoke of the county hospital’s future as it takes on operational duties for the neighborhing children’s hospital. this time, it’s on a more permanent basis. so where does the deal stand now? on march 10th, children’s avoided bankruptcy by agreeing to pay off 50 million dollars of the nearly 90 million it owes u-m-c for services and staff it need to function. the county is eating the other 40 million dollars calling it a capital investment. in return, u-m-c effectively gains control of children’s. children’s will stay a separately licensed hospital … … with a separate board of directors and it’s own medical board and c-e-o. u- m-c now has the right to appoint and-or remove children’s hospital board members. that’s brings us to the latest development. county commissioners unanimously voted in two of the new umc board members today. and in the process, abc-seven learning a lot of work is need to make the agreement work. ABC-7’s andrew j. polk conitnues our complete coverage. andrew? rick and maria, commissioners voted unanimously to approve Joy Martinez and Miguel Fernandez to the umc board… setting the tone of future relations between the two bodies. county judge veroncia escobar laid out the serious tasks ahead of the new members… including getting the technical parts of the deal with children’s done, continuing the work on umc’s clinics… and most importantly – working to keep communication flowing and the relationship with commissioners working. escobar said that the county is making progress on it’s side of the deal for oversight in light of the children’s hospital deal… while martinez said she’ll be working to get up to speed and contributing as quickly as possible. “i realize this is going to be challenging journey as Judge Escobar described. There’s been some tough times.” “We’re making progress So we have come up with um kind of our list. And umc will review it tomorrow formally in their meeting in executive session. And we’re hoping there’s resolution on that pretty quickly.” the negotiations continue with a hard deadline of the end of april to get critical funding for el paso childrens. maria? thanks andrew … the county also talked about texas