Whitley says Cecero's retirement package was probably too high

That's just one of the opinions County Judge Glen Whitley expressed on JPS Thursday after the Republican Forum luncheon at the Petroleum Club in downtown Fort Worth.

After the luncheon, Whitley spoke at length about JPS Health Network and Chief Executive David Cecero, who announced his retirement Wednesday after a tenure marked with seven-year multimillion-dollar budget surpluses and escalating criticism that the public hospital was failing its mission of providing quality care for the indigent.

Among Whitley’s comments:

On retirement packages for JPS CEOs: Back in 2000, Whitley criticized the nearly $1.2 million retirement package JPS CEO Tony Alcini received as too generous. Cecero, who will continue to serve as an advisor, will be paid his annual salary of more than $700,000 through July 2009. Whitley said he also doesn't like  that deal. "I have had discussions with many of the board members. This package is more lucrative than I would have necessarily supported," Whitley said. "I have to trust their opinion that they did what they did in order to lay the path for the next person to come in."

On Cecero’s replacement: Whitley said the next head of JPS should have a public hospital background. Many criticized JPS’ decision in 2001 to appoint Cecero whose background was in private hospital management. “We both agreed that the hardest thing he was going to have to overcome was his lack of experience in the public arena and that there was a distinct difference between public hospitals and nonprofit,” Whitley recalled.

On how Cecero compares to his predecessor, Tony Alcini, who stepped down in 2000 amid problems with construction overruns and long waits at the central pharmacy and the emergency department: "In my opinion, David has failings [but] certainly not as many as Tony had and he leaves our hospital in a much better financial shape than what Alcini did.” Whitley listed JPS’ school-based clinics and its new patient towers as areas where Cecero has improved the hospital’s reach.

On that now infamous InSight Advantage report: "I had significant discussions with the board about how a $650,000 study could be done without the board knowing about it or having received results."

On JPS’ enormous surpluses: Whitley said he’s had concerns about the size of JPS’ surpluses in the past, but hasn’t taken a strong stance against them because he wanted to see how the costs related to the new patient tower would affect the hospital’s bottom line. "Quite honestly, we get into that building, we see what our operational costs are, we see how that continues to go, then one of two things need to happen: Either we need to greatly reduce the tax rate or we need to see we are not meeting priorities of the board and see some increase in that," Whitley said.

JPS officials say the tower will start admitting patients in June.

-Aman Batheja

Comments

[Unchainthedogs]

Next - Can we now look at MHMR of Tarrant County, that CEO, that organization? They advertise that there is a 24/365 crisis hotline. I called the other day and there was nothing available and it took 3 Admins to have a meeting and talk about it! MHMR of Tarrant County is a joke! How much does that CEO make?

[Robert Concord]

What is "JPS"? You should always spell it out in the first reference = good journalism.

It's JPS Health Network -- Richard Stubbe

[Unchainthedogs]

At Carter Blood Care we used to call it Just Point n Shoot (JPS).

[Unchainthedogs]

Because most of the blood that was delivered was for gun shot traumas. Go figure.

[Unchainthedogs]

John - You didn't quite get it right either did you? Wouldn't it be John Peter Smith Health Network?

[toocloseforcomfort]

It's actually the Tarrant County Hospital District, and John Peter Smith Hospital is the main campus. But that's not the point. Whitley needs to be careful when he talks about cuttin taxes. IF the district starts throwing money at its patient care problems, that surplus will disappear in a flash, and they'll be looking at tax INCREASES. That's the flip side of criticizing their surpluses and fat checks from the feds. Be careful what you ask for.

[flymast]

This JPS deal whether factual or not seems to be a discgrace to the taxpayers; first this is a tax supported public hospital that should first provide care to the needy and indigent, those who can be verified that don't have insurance and those with Federal Medicaid; second it should not be for affluent and our "underinsured" users and last of all it needs to be "reeingineered", dismantled, and put back together again; the first step is to hire a CEO with strong public health care background and next would be to develope a Strategy and go from there

[Carolyn in NRH]

What needs to happen here is, the County Commissioners need to go over to JPS and pack up the desks of every administrative person over there. And after they've done that, they need to pack up their own desks and get the hell out of Commissioners Court. I like Glen Whitley. I used to work with him. But he needs to take control of this fiasco today. And I don't mean "hire a task force" to "look into it." I mean, go over to the hospital tonight or tomorrow night and check things out in the ER, walk down the halls one day this coming week to assess the situation. It's the Commissioner's responsibility to know what's going on, and apparently they weren't doing their job if it took 7 years and a Startlegram article to bring them out of their coma. And what the hell is Cecero going to "advise" anybody about in his "advisory" position? It's quite obvious to anyone with an IQ of 7 or above that he has no idea what his job was. Get him the hell out of Dodge. And as far as a severance package? Cab fare to the bus station is enough.

[Carolyn in NRH]

Richard Stubbe: Don't even start me on "good journalism" and the Star-Telegram. The two can't even be mentioned in the same sentence. And grammer? Great googly-moogly! They get an F- as far as I'm concerned (only because there's no lower grade).

[Unchainthedogs]

What surplus?

[Unchainthedogs]

Carolyn - Your plan sounds like a great one. I to believe that a large part of the blame should go to the County Commissioners.