Panel OKs steps toward ES Hospital expansion

The wheels are finally in motion for the initial steps toward expanding Eureka Springs Hospital.

At its Nov. 21 regular meeting at The Auditorium, the Eureka Springs Hospital Commission approved a contract to spend $824,250 for the first two steps in the engineering phases of the project of remodeling and expanding the current facility.

“I’m really excited about the hospital expansion going forward,” commission chair Barbara Dicks said after the unanimous vote. “We’re moving and grooving.”

The vote came after architect Tom Johnson discussed the proposal with the commission, explaining the first two steps in the expansive process will be the schematic design phase and then the design development phase.

Those two steps are necessary to be completed in early 2023 when they will be presented as a way to hopefully get federal funding for the hospital expansion project.

“The contract we’ve written is based on a $30 million project,” Johnson said. “Our architectural engineering fee is at 7.85 percent of that figure. And that’s the figure that we will be building on at the start of the project. We’re going to request for you to authorize the first two phases. There’s five different phases of this contract and each phase has to be voted on by your commission.

“So, we’re asking for the first two phases, which add up to 35 percent , which was our target goal of trying to get 35 percent of the documents ready to take to Washington in February.”

Johnson said the first phase, schematic design, is 15 percent of the overall construction contract and the design development phase is 20 percent.

“We basically take the design we develop … in the first phase and carry that further to make sure that everything is workable,” he said. “We start putting equipment and dimensions and that type of thing just to make sure that the whole project is workable. … And from that point on, we would of course, hopefully the project would be funded, but we would stop until we got authorizations to proceed further after you get your funding to go on into the construction documents, the procurement phase for bidding and then observing the construction during the construction process.”

The total price of the initial phases of the project is $2,355,000.

“That’s the 7.85 percent of the $30 million [of the entire expansion project],” Johnson said. “… Schematic design phase is $353,250 and the design development phase is $471,000, and that totals up to the $824,250, which is 35 percent of the overall contract.”

Commissioner Kent Turner clarified with Johnson that the proposed contract had a termination clause.

“If something happens and we opt out of the project, we can stop the project at any time and then all we owe you is for what you’ve worked on to date, is that correct?” Turner asked.

Johnson confirmed and said he was convinced that the work could be completed in time for an anticipated February 2023 presentation in hopes of being granted federal funds.

“So, you’re comfortable that in your phase one and phase two, that we will be able to get to a point where we’ll be able to properly demonstrate this project to funders, regardless of who that may be?” Turner asked.

Johnson replied: “You’ll have the scope well defined at that point.”

CEO REPORT

In her monthly report to commissioners, hospital CEO Angie Shaw said there were 13 positive cases of COVID-19 in October out of 147 tests.

“We are starting to see some positive flu cases as well as RSV in both adults and children,” she said.

Shaw said the hospital is currently hiring a variety of staff for its clinical services department including RNs, LPNs, respiratory therapists and radiology technicians.

The emergency room saw 287 patients in October, down from 315 the same month a year ago.

“Out of that 287, we admitted 24 patients and 28 were transferred out to a higher level of care,” she said.