Beaver sells its care home

By Will DeShong, Eagle Staff Writer

November 23, 2013 Last Updated: November 23, 2013 09:44 AM Local News

$37.5 million paid for county facility

BRIGHTON TWP, Beaver County — While Butler County continues to pursue the sale of the Sunnyview Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, Beaver County has agreed to sell its nursing home.

Beaver County commissioners announced Thursday the sale of that county’s Friendship Ridge nursing home to Comprehensive Healthcare Management Services for $37.5 million.

Comprehensive, a Pennsylvania-based group composed of four principal investors, already has paid Beaver County $8 million and will pay the rest when the deal is finalized March 1.

Tony Amadio, chairman of the Beaver County commissioners, said the sale is the largest transaction the county has made in its history.

“We spent the last two years with Friendship Ridge on the top of our list,” he said. “It took up probably 70 percent of our time.”

Amadio said Comprehensive was created to buy Friendship Ridge, but each of the investors involved owns other nursing home properties.

“They’re very experienced,” he said.

Amadio said Friendship Ridge is the third-largest nursing home in the state.

With 589 beds and nearly 600 employees, the six-story Friendship Ridge is almost three times as large as Sunnyview, which has about 220 beds and more than 200 workers.

But the enormous size of the facility also came with a heavy cost.

“It got to the point where we were $5 million in the hole,” Amadio said, adding the home had a $59 million budget this year.

Sunnyview, which has about a $20 million budget, is expected to have about a $1 million deficit in 2014.

The Beaver County commissioners last year told the nursing home’s union that they would sell the home if the deficit was not cut.

Friendship Ridge’s workers are represented by SEIU Healthcare, which is the same union representing Sunnyview.

After a few meetings between the two sides, the county determined the union’s proposals would not sufficiently cut the deficit and began pursuing buyers.

Amadio said the county in May set the minimum bid for the facility at $25 million and received five offers through June.

Beaver County used the Chicago-based firm of Marcus & Millichap to market the sale. That is the same company that Butler County is using to market Sunnyview.

Butler County has set a minimum bid for its property at $13.5 million.

Amadio said the firm is easy to work with.

“They were great,” he said of Marcus & Millichap. “They knew exactly who was capable of coming up with the millions of dollars needed.”

The county then did site inspections of the two top bidders before awarding the contract to Comprehensive.

While it was a difficult process, Amadio said he thinks the relationship between the county and the home’s workers is still in good standing.

“There was no fighting or anything like that,” he said. “The deal worked out well for both of us. We saved those jobs and saved the home.”

There is a clause in the agreement mandating that Comprehensive negotiate with the home’s union, and that it must give first preference to the home’s vendors.

The three contracts between the home and the union expire at the end of February.

Beaver County also will keep the oil and mineral rights under the property.

Amadio said he is confident that the sale will be to the benefit of the nursing home.

“Eventually it will be even better because they will be able to infuse more money into it,” he said.

Amadio said he wishes Butler County well in its sale of Sunnyview, noting the trend of counties selling their nursing homes is only going to continue.

“It’s just becoming not economically feasible to run them anymore,” he said.