Six Hospice Members Resign Dispute Over Donations, Remark By Hospital Administrator Spark Revolt

Six of seven Hospice Advisory Council members resigned this week after a dispute with Bonner General Hospital administrators.

The members of Hospice, an organization that serves the terminally ill and comforts their grieving loved ones, feared the hospital would start spending money on unrelated expenses.

“When my father died I gladly gave money to Hospice in his name,” said Hospice volunteer Bob Hamilton at an emergency meeting called Friday. “I’ll be damned if the money I give will be stuck on a brass plaque and put on a new floor polisher.”

At a meeting last month, the hospital said it wanted to take control of donations and memorials made to the Hospice program.

The money, much of it raised by Hospice volunteers or donated as memorials to those who have died, was to be put in the hospital general fund. The Hospice council would have no say in how the money would then be spent.

“Your decision to bypass the council and control all financial aspects of memorials without consulting the council and without notifying contributors is unacceptable,” the six resigning members wrote.

“We do not agree with your tactics or logic used concerning these memorial monies.”

The suggestion by Hospital Administrator Gene Tomt that memorials could be spent on “floor cleaning” outraged Hospice members.

Tomt was not available for comment. He was also not at the meeting, which drew about 35 hospice workers and hospital staff members.

Hospital spokesman Mary Henriksen, who has worked with the Hospice program, said the incident is an unfortunate misunderstanding.

“Hospice funds won’t go into the general fund for the hospital. I can tell you that won’t happen,” Henriksen said at the meeting.

“The break with the advisory council has been a terrible misunderstanding on everyone’s part, including ours.”

Henriksen and two other hospital officials said Tomt’s remark about using funds to clean floors was a “poor example.”

The hospital only wanted to expand the number of programs where Hospice funds could be used, said Henriksen, adding that would not include building maintenance.

Neither side had any problem with how Hospice funds have been spent in the past, or the quality of care provided by the program and the hospital.

The major issue was where Hospice money will be spent in the future and who will make those decisions. Roger Nichols, one of the Hospice board members who resigned, said the hospital has trashed the agreement by which the two organizations merged.

The 1991 agreement said the Hospice council would recommend policies and procedure and how funds are to be spent.

“How can the agreement just be washed away,” Nichols said. “I feel like my trust has been betrayed. And, I resigned because no one can tell me what the criteria are and how these funds will be spent.”

The hospital is rethinking how it handled the issue, Henricksen said. For now, Hospice funds will not go into the general fund and it is still unclear who will decide how that money will be spent, she said.

Smaller groups of Hospice workers and hospital administrators plan to meet next week to hash out some solutions.