County Seeks to Void Hospital Referendum

Ventura County supervisors agreed Tuesday to ask the 2nd District Court of Appeal to nullify a countywide referendum on a new outpatient wing at the county hospital.

The county recently lost a lawsuit it filed to disqualify the referendum, which is sponsored by Community Memorial Hospital.

Officials of the private nonprofit hospital, two blocks from Ventura County Medical Center, believe the $51-million outpatient wing will drive the county deeper into debt and ultimately be used to attract patients from other hospitals.

But county officials said Community Memorial misled voters who signed the petition to qualify the referendum for the March 26 ballot. More than 40,000 voter signatures were collected with the help of professional signature gatherers hired by Community Memorial.

Board Chairwoman Maggie Kildee said the project is not intended to compete for private patients but to better serve the poor and uninsured. Kildee and other officials also said the project will not be paid for with property taxes as alleged by Community Memorial but with federal grant money and hospital revenues.

Noel Klebaum, assistant county counsel, said the request for a writ of mandate would probably be filed with the appeals court next week. If the court agrees to review the request, an appeals hearing would be scheduled immediately, he said.

He said the other option would be to file a regular appeal, but in this case the county would have to wait until after the March election for a hearing.

John McDermott, an attorney representing Community Memorial, said the vast majority of requests for writs are denied. He said he was confident that would be the case with the county’s request.

If the county’s request for a writ is denied, it could still file a regular appeal, Klebaum said.