The Joplin Globe, Joplin, MO

Carthage, Jasper County

Discussion

March 4, 2008

MSSU officials reconsidering plan to use Carthage building

By Susan Redden

sredden@joplinglobe.com

CARTHAGE, Mo. — An agreement that Missouri Southern State University take over the former McCune-Brooks Hospital building in Carthage might be in question.

Bruce Speck, university president, said no decision has been made by the university’s Board of Governors, but financial concerns are causing officials to take another look.

“But the economic issues involved in taking on the building are big ones,” he said. “After some discussions, we’re realizing that moving ahead with the building would require a significant investment, and we don’t have it.”

Speck said the board has asked for a third-party review, and that an engineer’s report on the condition of the building has been completed and sent to board members.

The board should take up the question at its March 14 meeting, he said.

When the university started talks involving the building, Speck said, it was with the understanding that money would be available from the state for additional operating costs. Now, he said, there are questions that money will be available.

The agreement for the university to take over the building was reached after plans for a new hospital were announced. City and hospital officials said they did not want the large building in central Carthage to sit empty after hospital operations moved into a new building.

The agreement came when Julio Leon was president of the university. He stepped down last August, and Speck took over as president last month.

Mayor Jim Woestman said Carthage officials are worried that university officials “want to back out on the agreement.”

“The costs they’re talking about have been there since day one,” he said. “It’s not a new building.”

The uncertainty also applies to related plans for the regional crime lab now at MSSU to move into part of the former hospital. The lab was to be the first occupant of the building, in an area used for emergency services and radiology. The move for the crime lab was to come about six months after the hospital vacated the building, according to discussions in late December among city and university officials, officials with the Carthage R-9 School District, and others involved in the project.

Speck said building officials at MSSU estimated that the former hospital needs about $500,000 in roof repairs and other work.

“We began talking about it and realized that in addition to money for operations, there would have to be other significant investments, and we didn’t have it,” he said. “The board wanted to make sure our assessment was either validated or refuted by an external source, so they asked for a report from an outside engineering firm.”

The report from the Kansas City firm said the building had been well-maintained and “with some immediate repairs could no doubt operate as a hospital tomorrow.”

For MSSU to use the building, immediate repairs and long-term changes and renovations would be needed, the report said. The firm identified about $374,000 in immediate repairs plus other, longer-term “desired” projects.

Speck said it’s not the intent of MSSU officials “to be negative about the building or the agreement.”

“We’re willing to talk, but the real issue is we don’t have the economic resources to bring to the table if we don’t get the state money,” he said.

Speck said he did not know how the board’s re-evaluation would affect plans to move the crime lab, though he did note plans have been made for the lab’s space at the university.

Moving plans for the university and the crime lab were tied together, according to Capt. Steve Hinesly, who directs crime-lab operations for the Missouri State Highway Patrol.

He said $500,000 that had been allocated to prepare the former hospital space for the lab and to cover moving expenses had been in a state supplemental budget appropriation, but has since been removed.





Letter of intent



The Carthage City Council on Nov. 22, 2005, approved an ordinance authorizing a letter of intent to sell the former hospital to the university for $1. The letter outlining sale details was signed by then-Mayor Kenneth Johnson on that day, and by Julio Leon, then university president, on Jan. 26, 2006.

It specified that if a final sale agreement was not executed by Dec. 31, 2007, the letter would terminate unless it was mutually extended by the two parties. Though a sale contract was drafted, it was never approved, according to Lynn Campbell, city clerk.

Text Only
Carthage, Jasper County
  • Jim-Spradling-obit.jpg Carthage attorney, reformer of revenue department, dies

    James R. Spradling, a Carthage attorney who was noted for his reform of the Missouri Department of Revenue in the 1970s, died at 5:50 a.m. Monday at McCune-Brooks Regional Hospital.

    August 9, 2010 1 Photo

  • Bondswoman charged with false imprisonment

    A bail bondswoman from Carthage is facing a charge of false imprisonment for allegedly attempting to put a man in jail without a judge’s order, then taking him home and handcuffing him to the banister of a staircase until a friend of the man paid her his bond money.

    January 4, 2012

  • Man’s last statement to be given to defendant

    A judge ruled Monday that the Jasper County prosecutor must provide attorneys for Darren J. Winans with a videotaped statement co-defendant Matthew D. Laurin made about the Sheldon murders shortly before killing himself.

    August 23, 2010

  • Carthage proposes 1.6-cent rise in city property tax

    A drop in the assessed value of Carthage real estate will translate to an increase of about 1.6 cents in the city’s proposed property tax rate.

    August 9, 2010

  • Open house to celebrate projects at courthouse

    Projects completed last year at the Jasper County Courthouse will be celebrated in ceremonies Thursday in the courthouse lobby.
    County officials will join representatives of local chambers of commerce and others for a ribbon-cutting and open house to mark the opening of a Route 66 display in the lobby and a new “peace star” atop the building.

    May 9, 2010

  • Newton County Jail State budget cuts reduce county funds

    County officials are bracing for more state budget cuts to translate into a loss of county revenues.
    In an effort to balance Missouri’s budget, the state earlier this year cut the amount it reimburses county assessors for work to determine property values. The budget approved by lawmakers for fiscal 2011 calls for cutting the amount the state reimburses counties to house prisoners bound for state lockup.

    May 9, 2010 1 Photo

  • Jo Ellis: County home to rare yellowwood tree

    In late spring, drifts as white as snow fill the gutters and curbs on the east side of the Jasper County Courthouse. It isn’t snow, of course; it’s the fallen petals of the yellowwood tree that grows squarely in front of the door to the Jasper County Extension office.

    May 9, 2010

  • Jasper County Commission gets building project update

    Plans to close out one building project and start another were reviewed by the Jasper County Commission last week.
    Darieus Adams, Western District associate commissioner, met Thursday with officials of the firm who designed a $292,400 project to upgrade the lighting and make other changes to make four county-owned buildings more energy efficient.

    May 8, 2010

  • Two men running for associate judge in 39th Circuit take case to court

    Two men running for associate judge in Missouri’s 39th Circuit began battling it out in a Jasper County courtroom this week.
    Jasper County Circuit Judge Gayle Crane heard arguments Wednesday concerning the disclosure of documents sought by Robert “Bobby” George, Aurora, the current Lawrence County prosecutor.

    May 7, 2010

  • Carthage tiger Unveiling ceremony celebrates CHS tiger

    Kandy Frazier, Carthage High School principal, summed it up once the new addition to the CHS campus was unveiled Thursday.
    The bronze tiger sculpture created by Carthage artist and sculptor Bob Tommey, she said, is the kind of work that would be found at a big university.

    May 6, 2010 1 Photo