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The state Health Planning and Development Agency has ruled against Regency Namakua’s application to build a 40-bed skilled nursing and intermediate-care facility at the Maui Research and Technology Park in Kihei.
The agency decided Monday that Regency Namakua had not demonstrated the need for its proposal on Maui. It said there are a significant number of unused skilled nursing beds on Maui, and that the need for skilled nursing home beds is declining.
While the state agency has ruled on the project’s merits, anyone may request a public hearing for reconsideration of the decision. The deadline to request reconsideration is March 16.
“Although the population is aging, nationwide, statewide and locally, there is a shift from facility-based care to home- and community-based care, which has resulted in decreased need for nursing home beds,” Hale Makua Health Services Chief Executive Officer Tony Krieg said in a statement Thursday. “On Maui, there are no waiting lists for admission to the existing three nursing homes. In fact, (last year) there was an excess capacity of 70 beds, on average, per day.”
Krieg said an additional 40 nursing home beds are planned as part of the West Maui Hospital and Medical Center projected to open in 2016.
“There is not a need for more nursing home beds on Maui,” Krieg said.
Hale Makua Health Services operates a 90-bed nursing home in Wailuku and a 254-bed home in Kahului, as well as an adult day health center and an adult residential care home. Hale Makua Wailuku had been a 124-bed nursing home up until April 2011, when administrators closed down an entire wing 34 beds due to an inability to fill the beds, according to the nursing home’s administrator, Connie Miller.
The Statewide Health Coordinating Council and the Tri-Isle Subarea Health Planning Council had recommended that the project be disapproved. However, the Certificate of Need Review Panel recommended conditional approval.
Calls to Regency Pacific Management, the parent company of Regency Namakua that also operates assisted living and care facilities on Hawaii Island, Kauai and the Mainland, were not immediately returned Thursday afternoon.
In its application for the nursing facility, Regency Namakua maintained that its project aligned with the Hawaii Health Services and Facilities plan, which cites “an acute shortage of long-term care beds for the elderly as one of the state’s primary health concerns.” According to Regency, Maui’s 75-and-older population is increasing rapidly. The company cited an independent market analysis that projected a need for up to 60 additional skilled nursing beds on Maui in 2013 and up to 130 to 150 additional nursing beds by 2018.
Regency Namakua has purchased nearly 5 acres in the research and technology park for the estimated $7.8 million project. The facility was originally proposed as a 125-bed, long-term care and skilled nursing medical center, but it was scaled back because after existing nursing facility and long-term care providers raised concerns about the size of the facility, according to an earlier statement by Andre Hurst, a managing member of Regency Namakua.
The company acknowledged the concerns and downsized the facility to 40 beds, Hurst said.
* Eileen Chao can be reached at echao@mauinews.com.