Sublette County Gives Hospital Pledged $2.7 Million Grant, Settles Feud

After withholding the money for about three weeks, the Sublette County Commission on Wednesday released its final $2.7 million in pledged grants to the Sublette County Hospital District and let the district divorce itself from a requirement to provide the county with a Public Health office.

That’s in exchange for the transfer of a 1.87-acre plot of land out of the hospital district’s hands, into county property. The land could help the county build or arrange a better home for Sublette County Public Health.

Hospital leaders are thrilled to see the resolution, Hospital District public relations director Kari DeWitt told Cowboy State Daily on Thursday.

“How pleased I am that we were able to find a solution that 10 out of 10 board members thought was the best way forward,” she said, referencing five county commissioners and five hospital district board members. “Because when do you see that in politics?”

Sublette County Attorney Clayton Melinkovich in his Thursday interview touted the solution as the answer to a long-running issue: the county has a legal duty to provide space for public health.

Transferring that duty onto another entity via a contract didn’t work out, he said.

“Relying on another entity to provide that space for public health isn’t really viable in the long term,” he said. “And that I think, realistically, is where everyone landed last night.”

County Commission Chair Lynn Bernard echoed that sense, saying he’s “very pleased the hospital district received their money.”

The withholding wasn’t meant to be forever, and it wasn’t meant for “their detriment,” but to secure guarantees pertaining to their agreement, he said.

“I’m very happy with it,” said Bernard. “The commissioners had to keep the best interests of all in the county in mind … and I think we’ve accomplished that.”

But First, The Saga

The Sublette County Commission on May 20 withheld the nearly $2.7 million grant — the last of the $25.4 million it had pledged toward the long-term care facility portion of a $78.8 million hospital build.

That was in response to the hospital district voicing doubts about whether it could provide the agreed-upon facilities for Sublette County Public Health within a timeframe to which it also agreed, the discourse from a video of that meeting indicates.  

“(Considering) the nature of opening a hospital in 2025, the negative cash flow – that’s where our meeting with Public Health was asking for more time,” said Interim Hospital CEO Greg Brickner during the May 20 meeting of the Sublette County Commissioners. “We will have dismal cash flow through the foreseeable future, for the first six months.”

Some commissioners at another meeting June 3 derided the hospital district’s hesitancy as a failure to uphold its end of the 2022 agreement between the two entities, in which the hospital district pledged to provide for the Public Health office, while the county pledged $20 million toward the build. That figure was later inflated by a February 2023 vote, to $25.4 million.

The hospital district vowed to provide for public health because it leveled the prior public health building to make room for its build.

County Hospital Board Chair Tonia Hoffman countered commissioners, saying the hospital wasn’t in breach of contract yet since it had until early 2026 to find a solution for the Public Health office under the agreement’s terms.

Hospital leaders also delayed the facility’s opening from July 1 to Aug. 4 in light of the withholding. And they voiced worries that the dent in their finances, albeit temporary, would jeopardize their ability to retain staff and maintain certain federal reimbursements.  

Aug. 4 is still the anticipated opening date, DeWitt told Cowboy State Daily on Thursday.

The Agreement, And What It Says

The county and hospital district met Wednesday evening in Marbleton to hash out a new solution for the Public Health office.

Some county commissioners bemoaned what they cast as squalid conditions at the current Public Health facility, while hospital leaders said they’ve done an adequate job keeping up with maintenance requests.

A pending, but unanimously favored agreement between the hospital emerged from that meeting, said DeWitt.

The agreement, which neither entity has signed but which both have indicated they will sign, says the hospital district will transfer one of its properties – at 317 Faler in Pinedale – to the county, contingent on the hospital’s financing partners’ approval.

The county will take over the utility payments and maintenance work for public health, which currently sits in a hospital district property known as the annex to the Sublette Center: which is smaller than the agreed-upon size goal of 6,000 square feet for that agency.

And public health and veterans’ services would both fall under the county’s purview and care. The hospital would be relieved of its burden to provide for those, the agreement says.

It also says that if the hospital district decides to get rid of the Sublette Center, it will give the county an option to buy that for 80% of fair market value – which is a holdover from the original agreement.

If the district doesn’t build a hospital, no longer operates a hospital, is dissolved or merges with any other entity, everything the county gave to the hospital would revert back to the county, if the county chooses.

Not Sure What’s Happening Here …

The agreement allows public health to remain in its current space for two years, or additional time if needed upon negotiation.

Whether the county will build a structure for public health on the transferred property or house the agency in the building that’s already on it, or pursue some other option is “to be determined,” Melinkovich told Cowboy State Daily on Thursday.

A private physical-therapy business, Proactive Rehabilitation and Fitness, already occupies the 317 Faler property, and has been paying the hospital district $5,450 in rent, said Melinkovich.

The fate of that business’s habitation is also yet to be determined, he said.

It may vacate willingly, opt to stay, or negotiate with the county, to which it will now owe its rent, he added.

The owner of Proactive did not return a Cowboy State Daily phone message request for comment by publication time.

Sublette County Public Health Nurse Janna Farley, whose office line rang interminably over the course of two attempted phone calls, did not return a late-day email request for comment Thursday.  

What We’re Not Doing

The hospital district had brought another proposition to the commission at the start of Wednesday’s meeting: for the hospital to house Public Health in an unoccupied portion of the Pinedale Town Hall, while paying rent to the town of Pinedale.

“It was a really nice offer,” said DeWitt in reflection, “but we would have had to remodel that, and would have had to pay rent to the town of Pinedale in perpetuity.”

Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.