A California developer is moving forward with plans to build a second hospital on Maui after securing financing from an undisclosed lender.
Newport Hospital Corp. President Brian Hoyle told the Star-Advertiser that he has a financing commitment from a private equity real estate investment trust to build a 14.9-acre medical facility in Kaanapali for $65 million to $70 million.
Plans include a 25-bed critical access hospital, 40-bed skilled nursing facility, 40-unit assisted living center and 30,000-square-foot medical office building. The hospital will include a 24-hour emergency room, operating rooms and laboratory, imaging and pharmacy services. The facility will not perform major surgeries, but will offer elective procedures and be able to stabilize critical patients before transferring them to Maui Memorial Medical Center, the island’s sole hospital, about an hour away.
"I’ve lived here in this community, and I’ve seen people die unnecessarily because of the isolation from emergency medical services," said Joseph Pluta, president of the West Maui Hospital and Medical Center Foundation, who has advocated for a West Maui hospital for the past 15 years. "If you live here and your family was living here, you’d be scared to death because it’s not safe."
Hoyle originally won state approval to build a West Maui hospital in 2009 but said he lost financing from a source tied to Lehman Bros.
"It’s been a quest to find financing," he said, declining to disclose details of the sale-lease back deal in which the Newport Beach developer will build the facility and then sell it to the trust.
Hoyle has established the nonprofit West Maui Hospital Foundation to operate the medical center, expected to open in mid-2016 and be managed by Critical Access Healthcare.
Newport Hospital will operate the skilled nursing and assisted living facilities, which will be managed by Mission Health Services. Construction is projected to begin in late 2014 or early 2015.
