From the Tulare County Grand Jury, which today released a report on the Tulare Local Healthcare District and Tulare Regional Medical Center:
“The Tulare County Grand Jury today released a scathing report on the Tulare Local Healthcare
District (dba Tulare Regional Medical Center) and its failed attempt to expand its facilities
following an $85 Million bond issue passed by voters in September, 2005. The report (the full
text of which is attached) cited that the TLHCD Board of Directors “withheld financial
information to which tax payers were entitled.” In fact, over a five-year period, TLHCD’s Bond
Oversight Committee repeatedly requested financial information specifically pertaining to the
expenditure of bond funds which had still not been provided when the Grand Jury report was
finalized.
The Grand Jury report also discloses that extraordinary costs were incurred by the District in the
form of seven hundred (700) change orders during the construction of the Phase I Tower project.
These change orders amounted to $17,511,869. in additional costs of construction. The Grand
Jury’s exhaustive investigation covered seven months and included interviews with numerous
witnesses as well as the review of hundreds of pages of subpoenaed documents. This process
rendered a four-page report containing eight “facts,” seven “findings” and three
“recommendations.” The Report give the Tulare Local Health Care District Board of Directors
ninety days in which to formally respond.
2015-2016 Grand Jury Foreman, Chuck White, explained that standard procedure is for Grand
Jury reports to be released all at once in late May or early June when they are compiled and
distributed in the Final Report of the tem1. “However,” White said, “We believe that the facts,
findings and recommendations of this report are so important and so long overdue that an early
release was warranted.”
The full report is available below: