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Eureka Springs Hospital appears to be close to having a new CEO.
After a 35-minute executive session to discuss two finalists for the position at the end of the hospital commission’s monthly meeting on Monday, April 21, the commission voted unanimously to “extend an offer of unconditional employment to the candidate of choice.”
The candidate wasn’t named before the vote, but Sandy Martin, chair of the commission, later confirmed to the Eureka Springs Times-Echo, sister newspaper to the Carroll County News, that Tiffany Means of Fayetteville is the commission’s choice for the role, which has been filled on an interim basis since early November by Jodi Edmondson, the hospital’s human resources director. The commission terminated the previous CEO, Angie Shaw, at the conclusion of a special meeting on Nov. 1. Shaw has since filed a wrongful termination lawsuit in Carroll County Circuit Court.
Attorney John Tull of Quattlebaum, Grooms and Tull in Little Rock said not identifying the candidate before the vote was a violation of the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act.
Tull represents the Arkansas Press Association and is widely recognized as an expert on Arkansas’ open-records law. Tull is also a member of the Arkansas Freedom of Information Task Force.
Tull said he discussed the issue with Robert Steinbuch, professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Bowen School of Law and also a member of the FOI task force. Steinbuch agreed that not identifying the candidate was a FOIA violation, Tull said.
Contacted by the Times-Echo, Martin identified Means as the candidate, but later emailed to cite a question and answer from the Arkansas Freedom of Information handbook, which says: “Q. When the specific purpose of an executive session is announced in public (Ark. Code Ann. § 25-19-106(c) (1)), must the individual public officer or employee be named? A.
No.”
“This is from the FOIA handbook - and this it what I followed,” Martin said in her email. “I’d appreciate if you would honor that.”
“That is for the discussion but if they have discussed and agreed to hire they have to announce it in my opinion,” Tull said by email. “To go in they were considering but if they picked that is different.”
Martin told the Times-Echo that while there was a vote to extend an offer to a candidate, no offer had been made as of Tuesday, April 22.
“No - she hasn’t been offered the position which is why we stated to proceed with an offer of conditional employment,” Martin wrote in an email. “As there has not been an offer made - we prefer she not be mentioned.”
Means’ resume, recently obtained by the Times-Echo through an open-records request, lists her current position as “Independent Healthcare Consultant” for Hollywood System, in Hollywood, Calif., and Quorum Health/ American Health Systems in Waukegan, Ill. She held the same role at Methodist Health System in Dallas from 2021 to 2023 and at Northwest Health System in Bentonville from 2023-2024.
According to the resume, Means’ employment background includes “Director of Emergency Service” from 2017 to 2021 and “Standalone Emergency Project Director” from 2019 to 2020 at Northwest Health Systems in Springdale, and “Nursing Director, Inpatient and Emergency Services,” from 2007 to 2017 at Mercy Health System in Rogers.
Means’ education includes a doctor of nursing practice degree from the University of Missouri, a master’s in health care administration from Missouri State University and a bachelor of science in nursing from Southwest Baptist University.
“That’s exciting that we’re pursuing a candidate,” Martin said at the meeting after the vote to extend an offer.
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