The Debate Over the Future of Witherell

By Stephen Janis

 

Converting Nathaniel Witherell to a privately managed facility started with a simple idea: 
If Witherell is losing money, perhaps handing the reins over to a for profit firm would solve its fiscal woes.  

But since then the process of deciding how this idea would work – if at all – has been buffeted by a broader debate: what type of town is Greenwich?  What does the city owe to residents who can no longer take care of themselves?  And would privatization fundamentally alter the broader challenges facing nursing homes across the country? 

“I think it’s on hold,” said Penny Monahan, a former Greenwich police department employee and later a selectwoman who served from 2000 through 2006.

“I believe they were ready to go until we got a ground swell of residents who spoke out against it.” 

Indeed that sentiment was evident from the hundreds of pages of comments presented to the Representative Town Meeting  (RTM) during a hearing on the issue last fall. Testimony from residents which Monahan said made their opinion clear: Greenwich can afford to subsidize Witherell just like other amenities. 

“I believe we need to restore Nathaniel Witherell to the wonderful facility it was just a few years ago,” she said.

But the debate, however impassioned, is also lacking a critical piece of information: the details of the deal itself.  How exactly would Allaire – the firm selected by a special board to manage it – work? What expenses would they cover, and what would Greenwich’s obligations be in return?  

These questions are difficult to answer in part because according to Witherell’s board chairman Lawrence Simon a deal has not yet been made.

“There is no deal,” Simon told the Sentinel. 

In fact, Simon noted that both parties are not yet close to coming to any sort of agreement. 

“This could take six to twelve months,” he added.

With the state of the negotiations in flux, Simon was frank about the expectations that privatizing Witherell would fundamentally alter the financial challenges facing nursing homes.  

“Some think privatizing will make the costs go away,” he added. “They won’t.” 

Where that leaves the move to privatize Witherell is unclear.

“The town is deliberate and the town is thinking it through,” said William Drake, who was a member of the special board that selected Allaire as the firm best equipped to manage Witherell. He supports efforts to privatize,  but believes the vetting process will take time. 

“Could it go faster? I wish it would. You can’t be impatient. These types of decisions take reflection.”

But Drake says the Witherell board should not be the sole arbiter of if or how the hospital should be privatized. 

“The Witherell board cannot be the decision-maker on whether to continue management by the Witherell board.  That would be poor governance: like an employee writing his own performance review.”

But the board is not the only hurdle to placing the future the elderly care facility into the hands of a private firm. No less than three other bodies have to approve the deal once it is completed: Planning and Zoning, the RTM, and the Board of Selectmen, according to first Selectman Fred Camillo.

Camillo says for him the decision making process is about balancing the future of Witherell with the needs of the town as a whole. 

“When I got into office, I found we had been giving five and a half million in subsidies each year in the last nine years,” he said. 

“The main thing for me is providing quality of care while delivering it as efficiently as possible. We can’t keep giving five and half million. It’s not fair to a town of 60,000.”

“You have to do what’s right for everybody,” he added. 

But even if the agreement is approved by all the various bodies, there is one final step to privatization.  The heirs of Nathaniel Witherell have to consent to a change to the underlying deed which bequeathed the property to the town, says Drake. That entails altering the language which requires the hospital to be a non-profit entity. 

“We will have to reach out to the heirs and ask,” he said. 

Even while the process to privatize seems to be unresolved, the underlying fiscal challenges Witherell faces remain stark. 

At the Greenwich Board of Estimates and Taxation Meeting in August 2022, the finances of Nathaniel Witherell were front and center. 

Board minutes reviewed by The Sentinel recount how Comptroller Peter Mynarski complained that Greenwich was “bailing” out the senior care facility once one again.  His immediate concern, $6.3 million in uncollected debt that was past due more than 120 days.  

Witherell also had pension liabilities on its books for remaining obligations due employees before the town ended its defined benefits plan. It also is responsible for a $740,000 annual payment on the roughly $21 million in bonds to finance expansion of rooms, nursing stations, and rehabilitation facilities, according to annual financial reports filed with the state reviewed by The Sentinel.

The underlying fiscal realities is why Camillo says the process of positioning Witherell for a more financially stable future requires assessing all the needs of the town. 

“It’s a balance, there is a reason why town’s don’t run hospitals. I have no problem as long as we can do it the right way for everybody,”Camillo said. 

Still, for some Witherell remains such a distinct part of the fabric of the community that the only path forward is preserving the ties to the town. A commitment to the history of a hospital that speaks to the facility’s origins rooted in an act of charity. 

“We have beaches. We have an ice skating rink and parks that are beautifully maintained, nobody is complaining about them,” said Monahan, who notes Witherell’s start as a gift from the families of Robert Bruce and Natthaniel Witherell respectively. 

“The town accepted the donation under those conditions.  So I think they should be honoring it.”  

This is part three of a four part series on The Nathaniel Witherell.

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