Judge Markow BRMC COPN Decision

February 16, 2005
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

JUDGE MARKOW ORDERS QUICK REMAND TO COMMISSIONER OF HEALTH
Decisions on BRMC, WLMC, and Inova Fair Oaks Temporarily Set Aside

ASHBURN, VIRGINIA – Judge T. J. Markow, Circuit Court of the City of Richmond, has ordered the Commissioner’s decision on BRMC, WLMC, and Inova Fair Oaks be temporarily set aside and remanded to the Commissioner for a limited purpose. In his order, Judge Markow orders the Commissioner to:

1.) Re-distribute the Administrative Record within 30 days (no later than March 17, 2005) to include all information that should have been included in the Administrative Record by its close date of December 19, 2003, and any other information received by the Commissioner during his review;

2.) Conduct a hearing within 30 days of the distribution of the Administrative Record, to allow the parties to introduce evidence and present argument “regarding any information contained in the Administrative Record that was not part of the record on December 19, 2003”; and

3.) Reconsider all three decisions and issue final case decisions within 30 days of the hearing.

With the timeline spelled out in Judge Markow’s order, the Commissioner will have to issue final case decisions on all three COPNs by May 17, 2005.

“We’re confident the Commissioner will move swiftly on the remand and will once again come to the same conclusion that he did before when issuing the COPN to Broadlands Regional Medical Center,” stated Bryan K. Dearing, CEO of Broadlands Regional Medical Center.

 

SUMMARY OF FINAL ORDER IN

BROADLANDS APPEAL





The Court's Final Order confirms that the State Health Commissioner committed reversible error in issuing a certificate of public need to Northern Virginia Community Hospital for the Broadlands Regional Medical Center project. The approval of BRMC has therefore been set aside and NVCH no longer holds a COPN for the BRMC project. The Court further concluded that the NVCH case decision, the Inova case decision, and the Loudoun Hospital case decision were each dependent on the others. The Court therefore also set aside the Commissioner’s denial of Loudoun Hospital’s request to add 33 inpatient hospital beds at its Cornwall facility and the Commissioner’s approval of Inova Fair Oaks Hospital’s request to add 22 inpatient beds to that hospital. Each of these decisions will now have to be reconsidered by the Commissioner.



The Commissioner was ordered to reopen the administrative record on all three applications and to include in it all of the information that should have been included but was not. The completion of the record must occur on or before March 17. The Commissioner was further ordered to conduct a hearing within 30 days of the completion of the administrative record so that all parties could appear, introduce evidence and present argument regarding the information added to the record since December 19, 2004 when the record first was supposed to have closed. Based on all of the evidence, the Commissioner is then required to reconsider all three applications and issue new case decisions.

 

Nothing final here. Just another skirmish in a long legal battle.

Interesting to watch the spin from both sides. Obvious to see which side this professional post is from.

 

This "professional" unbiased post should also be appearing in Leesburg Today.

 

Check the following Leesburg2Day editorial cartoon that says it all!!

http://www.leesburg2day.com/images/Stilson021805.jpg

 

Anybody can draw and submit those. I could take the same cartoon and put Van Metre, Saul Centre on it and submit it and they'd probably print it. Just for fun I should do the same cartoon with a closet instead of a box and put Black and Delguadio on it.

 

Maybe you can but they wouldn't pertain to the topic...

 

My point is that the cartoon validates nothing and is mere opinion of the artist.

 

That's why they are called cartoons.


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