EWEB's new study will delay Triad deal.

Byline: Joe Harwood The Register-Guard

CORRECTION (ran 5/19/2005): The last few words were inadvertently omitted from a story that appeared Wednesday on pages D1 and D6. The story reported the Eugene Water and Electric Board's decision to study options for relocating its headquarters in case it decides to sell its downtown property to Triad Hospitals Inc. EWEB General Manager Randy Berggren warned the board that studying and then delaying the decision past a March 1, 2006 deadline might prompt Triad to look elsewhere for a place to build its new hospital. The last paragraph of the story should have read:

"In a 4-1 vote, with Sandra Bishop voting against, commissioners authorized Berggren to approach Triad and try to negotiate a three-month extension of the agreement."

News sources or readers who see errors in The Register-Guard are encouraged to call 485-1234 and ask for the News Department.

The Eugene Water & Electric Board on Tuesday expanded the scope of a design study to determine the costs to move all or part of the utility's campus from downtown to west Eugene.

While seemingly innocuous, the action taken by EWEB commissioners will have the effect of delaying any potential deal with Triad Hospitals Inc., which wants to purchase about 22 acres of the utility's downtown riverside campus and build a new McKenzie-Willamette Medical Center there.

Whether Texas-based Triad, majority owner of McKenzie-Willamette in Springfield, can live with the delay was unclear Tuesday night. Representatives of the hospital were not at the meeting.

Under an agreement in principal signed by the sides last year, the utility is supposed to have concluded by March 1, 2006, whether a move to west Eugene is financially feasible. But in expanding the scope of the cost study - which will now take an additional six to eight weeks to complete - commissioners on Tuesday learned that EWEB would most likely not meet that deadline.

Commissioners in February voted to fund a $792,031 study to determine the costs of moving the entire utility to 46 acres at Belt Line Road and Roosevelt Boulevard.

Tuesday night, they unanimously approved another $288,643 for a consultant group led by Eugene-based WBGS Architecture & Planning to also come up with the cost of moving the operations division to west Eugene but leaving administrative functions at the current location.

The board insists that any relocation to make room for a new hospital should not lead to rate increases, so EWEB and Triad won't know until those cost studies are complete whether they might be able to strike a deal.

Under the new scope of the relocation study, the costs for both a partial and a complete move are expected to be available at the end of October - which doesn't give utility officials enough time to put a bond refinancing measure on the November ballot.

EWEB owes $10 million to $12 million on its administration building, completed in 1988. Officials have long planned to refinance that bond debt at lower interest rates to help pay for new facilities in west Eugene.

If the new cost estimates are complete by Oct. 28 as planned, EWEB would have to wait until March 2006 to take the refinancing issue to voters, thus breaking the deadline.

EWEB General Manager Randy Berggren said the delay could prompt Triad to look elsewhere for a hospital site. But Triad officials have informally indicated that they are flexible, he said.

In a 4-1 vote, with Sandra Bishop voting against, commissioners authorized Berggren to approach Triad and try to negotiate a three-month extension of the agreement.