The Snoqualmie Valley Hospital’s period to accept proposals on its affiliation plans officially closed on Aug. 11. The hospital saw interest from five hospitals and health care providers, but received only one proposal, from Regional Health.

Tom Parker, CEO of Snoqualmie Valley Hospital, said the staff and board of commissioners and affiliation consultants will meet in a work study session at 6 p.m. on Aug. 30, to discuss and analyze the proposal.

Receiving one proposal changes the process only slightly, Parker said, because the board will not have to compare different proposals against each other and can focus on examining the one received.

“If we had received multiple proposals we would be assessing how those proposals met or didn’t meet the criteria of the RFP, then we would also be doing an evaluation of how they matched up, one against the other,” he said. “At this point we don’t have the task of comparing proposals, (we are) simply doing the part of how does this meet the criteria.”

Regional Health, the organization that submitted the proposal, is based in the Yakima Valley and is the parent company of the Sunnyside Community Hospital and the associated clinics. The organization is also in the process of finalizing the purchase of Yakima Regional Medical and Cardiac Center as well as the Toppenish Community Hospital.

At the hospital’s Aug. 10, board meeting, before the RFP deadline, affiliation consultant Steve Huebner gave a presentation on the next steps the board must take in the process.

Huebner and hospital staff will be working on analyzing the proposal and will begin a discussion with the Regional Health to clear up any questions they have. They will then form a report for the board of commissioners, highlighting the information from the proposal and from their discussions with the respondent.

At the next hospital board meeting, set for Sept. 14, the board will discuss whether or not to proceed with Regional Health’s proposal and continue work on the affiliation agreement.

“The goal of the (Sept. 14) meeting is for us to be able to have all of the input together in one place and have it focused so that we bring back to you what we believe the key issues are that all of you have identified,” Huebner said to the board. “So it will be issues that each of you have provided input into and then have that collective discussion of the commissioners around those issues and basically decision making from there going forward.”