March 28, 2024

Council passed first consideration of Skiff ordinance

On Monday, the Newton City Council unanimously passed the first consideration of an ordinance that will give Skiff Medical Center Board of Trustees the authority to make decisions on joint ventures and affiliations, contracts and various real estate transactions without seeking council action.

“We have been a city hospital in Newton since 1921. Since then, we have had an ordinance with the city regarding the relationship between the hospital and the city because the city owns the hospital,” Skiff Medical Center Chief Executive Officer Steve Long said. “The ordinance has only changed a couple of times over the 90-year history of the hospital.”

During a council meeting in February, council unanimously passed a resolution to support the action by the board to help ensure the continued existence of a hospital in Newton. Since February, the board at Skiff has been pursuing action to ensure that a hospital remains in Newton.

“We’re looking at changing the organizational structure of the hospital with going out and finding a partner due to the way health care is changing,” Long said. “When we looked at the ordinance, which describes the relationship between the hospital and the city, we realized it wasn’t very complete, as it looked like the last update to the ordinance dated back to the ’70s. We approached council about updating the ordinance and they agreed since it hasn’t been looked at in a long time.”

The changes to the ordinance would modernize the relationship between the city and the hospital similar to other city hospitals across Iowa.

“We requested changes to the ordinance, which effectively reassembles the relationship ordinance that Mary Greely Medical Center has with the city of Ames and copied that,” Long said.

The proposed ordinance changes follow Iowa code giving hospital boards certain responsibilities, which gives the hospital board the ability to run the hospital.

“It essentially says that the board of the hospital is in charge of running the hospital,” Long said. “It gives the board the power of buying and selling real estate, signing contracts, hiring and firing along with all the other operational duties hospitals do.”