Hospital on Brink of New Ownership

After weeks of tortuous negotiations, multiple court appearances and tension between buyer and seller, Westlake Medical Center finally appeared to be about to switch hands late Wednesday night.

“The papers are on their way to escrow,” said Les Bell, executive vice president of Salick Health Care Inc., the Los Angeles-based purchaser of the community hospital. “I’m lighting a cigar.”

When negotiations broke down earlier this month, Salick took Westlake’s owner, hospital conglomerate Columbia/HCA of Tennessee, to court to force the sale.

Last week a Los Angeles Superior Court judge ordered Columbia to sell the hospital for the $8.15 million price the two parties had settled on in March 1995.

Bell said Salick was ready to take over the hospital at 12:01 this morning.

“We’re as happy as can be,” Bell said. “We’ve already hired the staff, we’ve got the supplies to reopen the cafeteria, we’ve bought toilet paper so people can go to the bathroom.”

The future of the hospital has been in limbo for months, prompting anxiety in communities from Agoura to Newbury Park that place particular value on Westlake’s emergency room.

The only other emergency room in the immediate area is at the other hospital Columbia owns in eastern Ventura County, Los Robles Regional Medical Center in Thousand Oaks.

One of the sticking points of the sale was over that issue; the March 1995 contract prohibits Salick from having an emergency room, but Salick officials have said they do not want to ignore the needs of the community.

They have accused Columbia of trying to suppress local competition with the restriction.

The future of the emergency room remains an open question.

In her ruling ordering the sale, Judge Diane Wayne left that item unsettled, saying it could be litigated later.

Salick officials have said they plan to meet with community members as soon as possible to discuss the issue.