OSF HealthCare’s recent offer to keep a limited intensive care unit in Ottawa hinged on the city endorsing its broader consolidation plan, a condition city officials rejected as unfair and unacceptable.

After months of negotiations, OSF CEO Bob Sehring and President Dawn Trompeter proposed maintaining a “lower-acuity” ICU in Ottawa while shifting the sickest patients to their Peru regional hub. However, Ottawa Mayor Robert Hasty said the offer came with strings attached.

“Their offer required us to endorse their broader plan, which went beyond just this proposal,” Hasty said. “I don’t think that was a fair negotiation, and we cannot support it.”

OSF announced the plan on Friday, noting that they had offered to keep the ICU in Ottawa, but city officials and Citizens for Healthcare in Ottawa rejected the proposal.

Sehring and Trompeter said the plan would have kept ICU services in Ottawa but at a “lower-acuity” level, while sicker patients would be sent to the Peru facility, which OSF calls its regional hub.

“ICU services could have continued in Ottawa as long as the facility remained licensed, even if it wasn’t clinically necessary,” Sehring said. “We offered this modification to respond to community feedback and avoid another public hearing if the city and CHO could support it.”

Mayor Robert Hasty said the updated ICU offer from OSF was essentially the same as one presented a year ago, but with the language altered to make it seem like a new proposal, which he said did not address the community’s core concerns.

“The five ICU beds OSF offered were essentially intermediate care,” Hasty said. “They would not include ventilated patients, after-hours surgery, physician anesthesiology services, invasive radiology procedures, or inpatient dialysis. That simply isn’t enough for a full-functioning ICU, and we can’t support it.”

Colleen Burns, of CHO, said both the city and CHO were looking for a long-term solution to the ICU situation, not a band-aid for one year.

“It really just wasn’t enough,” she said regarding OSF’s proposal. “Truthfully, I think the data speaks for itself. That ICU needs to be maintained in Ottawa. So, we just weren’t willing to give…. We just didn’t think it was enough in terms of what they were offering for such a short term.”

OSF’s offer to maintain a limited ICU was contingent on Ottawa officials publicly supporting the plan. Hasty said that the requirement to support OSF going forward felt like undue pressure to accept their terms.

“On top of that, their offer required us to endorse them going forward, which could have went beyond just this proposal. We don’t think that was a fair negotiation,” he said.

“We were not trying to muzzle the city or community in any way,” Sehring said. “The intent was simply to move forward with a modification of the application only if the city and CHO felt they could support the plan. If they could not, we would proceed with the original application as scheduled.”

Hasty said a fully operational ICU is critical for all of eastern La Salle County, serving not only Ottawa but communities including Streator, Marseilles, Grand Ridge, and Sheridan.

While the consolidation plan moves inpatient obstetrics and ICU services to Peru, OSF emphasized it will maintain outpatient OB care across the region, including remote monitoring, traveling nurses, and a 24-hour nurse line.

Trompeter said the new model improves access to care for high-risk pregnancies while addressing staffing challenges in rural hospitals.

“Recruitment for specialists is difficult in smaller, more rural markets,” Trompeter said. “Centralizing services allows us to provide better care across the region while maintaining important services locally.”

Hasty said he was pleased that OSF recently clarified some questions about OB access, but stressed the city’s focus remained on keeping a fully operational ICU.

“ICU is considered the cornerstone of a full-functioning hospital that can truly provide full-access healthcare to a community,” Hasty said. “Their offer did not provide that.”

In the bigger picture for their consolidation plan, OSF described its Peru hospital as the regional hub for the area, emphasizing its central location and ability to concentrate specialized care.

However, Hasty questioned that designation, arguing the city’s larger working population and its role as a key access point for surrounding communities make it equally important in regional health planning.

“Our population is 19,000, but the working population is significantly higher because people come here for jobs at the county complex and other local businesses,” Hasty said. “When you factor in nearby communities that rely on Ottawa for services, it shows how central the city is to regional health care access.”

When asked whether Peru had an agreement or was in negotiations with OSF, OSF said city officials have supported the plan but denied that any formal agreement exists.

When asked if OSF offered similar concessions to Ottawa, Peru Mayor Ken Kolowski simply said, “I don’t recall.”

Shaw Local News Network is seeking records of all correspondence between OSF and Peru officials.

Concerned residents can contact the Citizens For HealthCare in Ottawa advocacy group on Monday, Oct. 27. To contact CHO, visit https://saveottawahealthcare.com/.

The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board will hear OSF’s proposal on Nov. 18 in Hinckley.