Statement to the Board of Commissioners of the Public Hospital District #1 I've come to several Commission meetings and | want to say again how disappointing it is that these meetings aren't being audio or video recorded. | know that the secretary does the best she can to record what is happening here but again my own comments from the meeting of March 15, 2010, haven't made it into the minutes in a way I'd recognize them. Beyond my own comments, I've seen for myself how so many descriptions of the debates that take place here simply aren't an accurate account of what took place, but seem to be what the administration might want to have recorded, not what actually happened. The Covington Reporter articles appear to have a more accurate representation of the Board meeting details than the official minutes. Sue Bowman ran on a platform of transparency and was elected because of this. She is one of the commissioners who is adamantly against any transparency and has voted against accurate feporting and recording of the meetings. How do we know what she believes or stands for if she reneged on one of the primary campaign promises? There have been enough questions about how things have been done here in the past that it really does seem like time that you start to care about the Public's right to know and start to videotape these meetings. Things like how it was decided to give the executive a $1.7 million payment without any public disclosure until it was discovered by the auditor, how it was decided to have public funds used to run political campaigns how it was decided to have the hospital insurance pay the executive's public disclosure penalty. The cost for video recording these meetings probably would not be as. much as the cost for producing and airing the commercials we see of the CEO saying nice things being beamed out of every nook and cranny of your campus and on broadcast TV. Odds are the local cities would allow you to have the meetings aired and repeated on their public access channels at no charge. This would allow taxpayers to know more about the remarkable things that are happening here. Remember this is a PUBLIC HOSPITAL and is funded by Taxes and Taxpayers pay YOUR salaries. We, the taxpayers, should at least have an accurate depiction of what takes place here and how decisions are madeand the discussion and debate that went into those decisions. Large governments videotape their meetings. Valley Medical is a very large government in terms of public dollars spent, size of the district and employees. We also have the highest paid, public official in Washington State. Just because some tiny rural hospital districts isn’t recording meetings, doesn't mean that Valley shouldn't do it. If you have nothing to hide, don't try and hide it. There have been plenty of questions about accuracy here — it is time to be open to the public and start videotaping meetings. The public is well aware that Dr Heide works at several hospitals, not just Valley or Auburn. The voters elected Dr.Heide knowing this and believe that he can do what is right. It angers me and insults me that Commissioner Carolyn Parnell would state at the March 15" meeting, that the electorate is ignorant enough to vote for Dr Heide because he told lies during his campaign. We know what is happening and it seems there are members of this board that want to do business in secrecy. Not disclosing the actions of the board is lying by omission. We the voters know what is right, that is why Dr Heide was elected. Another thing, if you are calling the 27,080 people that voted for Dr. Heide ignorant, then you are also calling those 2,616 that took the effort to WRITE-IN my name on their ballots ignorant too. And saying that Dr. Heide lied means you said | lied. | will tell you this that if | made any statements that were incorrect it was because the information in the hospital board meeting minutes were inaccurate. So that means you can say my statements were inaccurate but NEVER call me a liar. If | was wrong it was because of the inaccuracies in the meeting minutes, which we know are inaccurate, | never made any statements during the campaign that were Personal attacks and always stated that | did not and do not agree with the actions of the board of commissioners. The fact that a board member would make a statement like that at a board meeting is inexcusable and requires an apology to the voters of the hospital district and Dr. Heide. This brings me to the concerted attack towards anyone who differs in opinion with the hospital executives or the majority of the commissioners. Dissent is met with personal attacks, intimidation and threats, | wonder ifthere has been any dissent or differing opinion at Valley ever. It seems that anyone who has ever differed in opinion has likely been driven out, fired, or made to leave. Even commissioners are being attacked, Because of Mr. Hemstad’s dissenting opinions the previous board voted December 7" to have him investigated for making statements they believed to be detrimental to the hospital. This vote was done at a meeting when Hemstad wasn’t there. Dec 7" was after the election, which Dr. Heide beat an incumbent, but before Dr. Heide was sworn in. Clearly the Board and administration were all supporting Mr. Mike Miller's re-election and wanted the status quo to continue - only Mr. Hemstad was outspoken about the problems he has seen here. You were very mad that yet another incumbent had lost their re-election attempt. Ordering an investigation of Hemstad is just an act of retribution and revenge and should have no place by an elected body. Itis the job of every citizen to speak up at a public meeting if they think there is something wrong. It appears that if you are a commissioner you are not allowed to have a dissenting opinion. If you are a citizen/voter you can make statements but not ask questions. And those questions are likely to be ignored. If you do have a question you must write a letter to the Commissioners. But the commissioners are not allowed to write a response, the response must come from the executive. The only time a letter will be read ata meeting is if it is a complementary letter or it advances the agenda of the executive. ' know I've been here a while but remember one last thing for everyone to remember. The taxpayer is the final boss here. The chain of command: employees of the hospital are accountable to the executive, the executive is accountable to the Commissioners and the Commissioners are accountable to the taxpayers. The taxpayers don't know what is going on here and they need to know what is going on so they can make informed choices when they go to the polls. Cory Cappelletti — Citizen