“I’m comfortable that Bamberg employees will be given a fair shot at the jobs that will be open, when the new organization is created or comes to life so to speak,” Bamberg County Hospital Administrator John Hales told board members via conference call at their March 27 meeting.

Hales noted that he and other regional hospital officials went over “detailed plans” for Bamberg employees and Barnwell employees that will be “assimilated” into the “new organization” when it gets completed and the asset purchase agreement when signed and Dobbs Equity takes over.

Hales noted that beginning on April 4, all hospital employees will get a letter from him stating they have until April 16 to apply for the positions that will be available with the new organization. “And after the application process is completed, we will go over them one-by-one for the employees that have applied for that on the Bamberg side and make decisions as to the best employees to keep out of the pool that we have.”

“I think it’s a good thing,” Hales said adding, most employees will be given a shot at employment here or if they take it or not and decide to go somewhere else or if they have made arrangements it’s up to them. I feel good about the employees being taken care of.”

Also during the meeting:

• Hospital CFO Sally Border reported that February was “a very good month” because of debt setoff payments on accounts previously written off for bad debt. Border reported that the hospital received $458,000 from tax refunds that went directly to the hospital’s bottom line. It was noted that without the debt setoff payment the hospital would have recorded a $280,000 loss. But because of the debt setoff actually recorded a profit for the month the month of February. And due to the debt setoff money it received the hospital does have some cash going forward into March and some for April.

• Hospital Administrator John Hales, who spoke by phone after Border gave her report, noted that the hospital did another 13-week cash flow report and the facility was “holding its own now” with “no surprise.” Hales noted the hospital’s debt setoff of up to $553,000 was “a little bit ahead of schedule.” “We should come out with what we had planned for the year or maybe a little bit ahead of that,” Hales said.

During the Public Comments portion of the meeting:

Johnny Ruth Rosa of Denmark addressed board members by stating that she was working with a committee to stop the sale of the Bamberg and Barnwell County Hospitals. “We don’t want the Bamberg County Hospital sold,” Rosa said, adding, we will continue to stop it with our committee. We’re not in agreement on the sale of the Bamberg County Hospital.”