One came from Janell Privett, whose request includes a list of 14 items of information including WMC’s total expenditures on various legal fees and travel expenses for hospital administration and board members.
Privett initially made her Freedom of Information (FOI) request in writing to WMC Chief Executive Officer Noel Selle-Rea March 19.
She came to the Board meeting last week to ask the WMC Board members to reconsider her request for information — what hospital staff has estimated would total 6,000 pages in documents.
If her request is fulfilled, those 6,000 pages are estimated to cost Privett $5,000 due to the hospital’s set copying cost of .25 cents per page, and the cost of the hours it would take hospital staff to compile the documents.
Privett asked that she not be “put through hurdles” to receive the requested documents.
“I will get my answers,” she told the WMC Board. “I just think it would be sad for a public member to have to spend this amount of money when there are people hired to work for the public.”
Specifically, Privett’s FOI request asks for expenditures of WMC for legal services related to the new hospital construction project and those related to any attorneys or investigators used to investigate local physician Greg Salard, who has had his privileges at the hospital denied.
She also has requested expenditures of WMC relating to staff and hospital board travel since 2009, as well as Selle-Rea’s credit card statements and employment contract.
Privett said she is not requesting any information as a “personal vendetta” against the hospital, but for the reasons, or “frustrations,” with the hospital Board listed in the petitions filed with the city to recall eight of the nine WMC Board members.
“There is a heavy frustration among the community,” Privett said.
Selle-Rea told the Sentinel WMC has filled other FOI requests in the past, but Privett’s is of a magnitude that would be a “huge impact to the building.” It would require taking a member of the hospital’s staff away from their normal duties for a period of time to locate the requested documents — some which have been archived, Selle-Rea said.
WMC also received a request from Wrangell resident Judy Allen. In her letter to Selle-Rea and hospital board members, Allen has requested information detailing the “serious confidential allegations” made against Salard.
Late last year, the hospital board voted not to allow Salard to practice at the hospital. After a “fair review hearing” was held in February regarding that decision, where both Salard and WMC presented witnesses and testimonies on their behalf, the hospital board reaffirmed their previous decision to deny the doctor the right to see patients at the hospital.
Salard has since filed an appeal in court to the WMC Board’s decision.
Selle-Rea said Allen’s April 16 FOI request has been forwarded to the hospital’s attorneys. Because the Salard privileging issue has been brought to court, Selle-Rea said some information requested by Allen may not be releasable.
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