COS Tulare Center Bids Well Below Estimate

Tulare - Bids to construct phase one of College of the Sequoias' Tulare Center have come in $14.2 million below estimates and trustees were expected to award nearly 50 contracts at this week's board meeting.

Once awarded, the state must approve the contracts, a process that could take three weeks to two months, but which is not expected to affect plans to begin construction on what is officially the Tulare Center for Agriculture and Technology in late June, said Eric Mittlestead, dean of facilities and facilities planning.

Instead of hiring a general contractor, COS put each task in phase one out to bid separately and Klassen Corporation, a construction management company, will oversee the project.

Both state and local money will be used on this phase. State bond money will build 100,000-square-feet of academic buildings and local Measure J bond funds will pay for the bookstore, health center and main parking lot.

The 26 low-bids and management costs for the state portion total $36.9 million – $10 million below estimate – but the state won't allow the district to shift this cost savings to another portion of the project.

“The state money, the state takes back,” Mittlestead said.

The 22 low-bids and management fees on the locally-funded portion total $2.5 million, which is a $4.1 million savings on the estimate.

The excess funds budgeted will go back into the Measure J pot to reduce an anticipated $12 million shortfall on the overall project, Mittlestead said.

Phase two of the Tulare Center, which will include the vocational complex, is in the state funding cue but for all practical purposes “up in the air” because another statewide school construction bond would be required to generate the needed money, Mittlestead said.

COS had hoped the state would put a bond measure on the ballot this year, but that has not happened.

Plans for Phase three, which will include the farm animal buildings, are at the Office of State Architect and COS officials are hopeful construction will begin on that phase next year, he said.

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Sell No Longer Employed at Citizens

Tulare - Jeri Sell, who managed the Tulare office of Citizens Business Bank is no longer employed by the bank, a regional bank official said Monday.

Sell, contacted at her home, said she had no comment on her change of status or on the search warrant served at the 256 North K St. bank on April 21 as part of what police described as an on-going criminal investigation into the embezzlement of customer funds.

“We're working out the details,” was all Sell would say, when asked if she had secured her own attorney.

Law enforcement officers from the Tulare Police Department and the state Department of Justice served the search warrant at the bank at 9:45 a.m. Friday and witnesses said officers were still at the bank early in the evening and that a warrant was also served at Sell's home, a detail that police spokesman Sgt. Richard House said he could not confirm.

“The Tulare Police Department has no comment on the search warrant or any specific individual,” House said Monday. “There will no further comments unless new information is developed on the case.”

A spokeswoman at the Department of Justice referred all questions about the search to the Tulare Police Department.

House said the Citizen's investigation is a joint investigation between Tulare police and the DOJ.

The office of Tom Hornburg, Citizen Bank's attorney in Visalia, referred calls to Santa Rosa attorney John Friedemann, who did not reply to a phone call or e-mail prior to the Tulare Voice's deadline.

Police are asking people with information on this case to contact Cpl. Brian Haney at 685-2300, ext. 2152.

News of the investigation came as a shock to most people, especially given Sell's prominence in the Tulare, where she has been a well-respected leader and member of the banking community for 36 years.

In 2008, the Tulare Chamber of Commerce named her Tulare's Woman of the Year. She also is a past grand marshal of the Tulare County Fair Parade and played important roles in the passages of bonds to expand Tulare Regional Medical Center and build a College of the Sequoias campus in Tulare.

Lawsuit Allegations

The action last week was likely prompted, at least in part, by allegations in an August 2008 lawsuit filed against the bank and Sell in Tulare County Superior Court by Gloria McCauslin, owner of VIP Pizza. A trial date has been set for July 12.

The lawsuit alleges $47,527 in deposits were misappropriated by the bank and Sell between January 2001 and September 2007.

McCauslin's Fresno attorney, Frank M. Nunes, said approximately 24 deposits went awry during that period.

Citizens bank has denied allegations in its filings with the court.

A police investigation was in progress when the lawsuit was filed.

The decision to file before the investigation was completed was made because he wanted to act quickly given the amount of money involved and because of the bank's failure to act upon his client's losses, Nunes said.

While a regional bank officer did contact McCauslin and asked her to send a letter in writing, which she did, Nunes said McCauslin was never provided anything in writing regarding the outcome of an investigation bank officials promised to conduct in the summer of 2007.

She was only verbally told, the bank found nothing, he said.

In her conversations with Sell, Nunes said his client was told it was not possible for her money to be missing.

When she first became aware of missing deposits, McCauslin increased security measures from her end, including requiring two employees to make deposits instead of one, but money continued to disappear, Nunes said.

The time from 2001 to 2007 also included a period in which McCauslin's husband was diagnosed and treated for cancer. He died in January 2005.

The lawsuit accuses the bank of putting into place “a procedure wherein Sell self-audited her actions for receiving cash deposits from the plaintiff with no oversight, which allowed Sell to abscond with plaintiff's deposits without any check and balances to catch Sell.”

Asked about that allegation, Nunes said: “We know she is the manager and we know she's responsible.”

Nunes said his offices' investigation has produced other people who had similar problems with missing money at the bank and he said he hoped that if there are yet others who have experienced losses, they will contact him, as well as police.

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Tulare Regional Gets Second Accreditation

Tulare - Tulare Regional Medical Center now can boast two national accreditations.

Administrators received official word last week that the hospital and its clinics have been fully accredited by Det Norske Vertas (DNV), which the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) gave accreditation powers to in September 2008.

Tulare Regional is also accredited by The Joint Commission.

“In the Central Valley we will be the first hospital to have both,” CEO Shawn Bolouki told the Tulare Local HealthCare District board last month after Chief Clinical Officer Pat Mathewson reported DNV had conducted an unannounced visit at the end of February.

“Our numbers were very good compared with other organizations; we fully expect to be accredited,” Mathewson told the board.

She was pleased to get the official notice from DNV.

“It's a very good feeling, especially when you consider you've been accredited by two different organizations that take a different view,” she said Thursday.

The surveys are similar in that their job is to make sure hospitals meet CMS requirements to continue participating in the Medicare and Medicaid [Medi-Cal in California] programs.

DNV's accreditation program also looks at whether a healthcare facility meets the International Organization of Standardization (ISO) 1901 quality management standards.

An Oct. 27, 2008, article in Modern Healthcare magazine said:

“The ISO process is better known in industries such as auto manufacturing as a quality-management system with a heavy emphasis on leadership and accountability.”

In its own literature, DNV says “ISO is prized for its unique ability to pinpoint and sustain best practices” and quotes supporters who maintain its accreditation process is tailor made for customer-focused medical centers in pursuit of quality.

A major advantage of DNV is that the same surveyors come each year, as opposed to once every three years as The Joint Commission does, Bolouki said.

“It gives you a better understanding if you're making process and I can have a dialogue with them,” he said. “I think it's good for the hospital.” For now, the hospital will continue with both The Joint Commission and DNV accreditations, although officials could decide to eliminate one in the future.

“Each one brings a different focus to the organization,” Bolouki said. “There are certain things I like about each one.”

DNV is headquartered in Oslo, Norway, and has had a presence in the U.S. since 1898 and has about 300 offices in 100 countries, according to its internet website. Its U.S. regional office is in Houston.

In addition to healthcare, the company also offers quality management assessments for the maritime, oil, gas and energy, and food and beverage industries.

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Hoops of Hope Founder Coming to Tulare

Tulare - After Austin Gutwein spent a day in 2004 shooting more than 2,000 free throws and raising $3,000 for eight children orphaned because of AIDS, his parents thought their then 10-year-old was finished with the project.

“We honestly thought that would be it; we'd take him out for a milkshake and that would be it,” his mother, Denise Gutwein, said in a telephone interview last week in anticipation of her son's May 6 appearance in Tulare at the Mayor's Prayer Breakfast.

But as she and the rest of the world now know, Austin Gutwein had only just begun.
“I really want to do this again,” Gutwein recalled her son saying. “I want to get a thousand friends to do it.”

Thus was born Hoops of Hope – initially Baskets of Hope – which has raised more than $2 million to help build, among other things: the Jonathan Sim Legacy School in Twachiyanda, Zambia for 1,000 students; a clinic in Sinazongwe, Zambia, where AIDs patients once had to walk two to three days to the nearest clinic; a clinic near the Twachiyanda school; and four dormitories for students.

A World Vision video about a girl who was orphaned after she lost her mother to AIDS was the spark that got a then-9-year-old Austin Gutwein interested in doing something to help.

He came up with the idea for the basketball event after World Vision officials urged him to use basketball or “whatever you are passionate about” to come up with a fund raiser, his mother said.

Life after that first event has not been the same. Austin, who is home schooled because of his schedule, has traveled throughout the U.S. and elsewhere drumming up support for Hoops for Hope.

Prior to his scheduled Tulare appearance, for example, he will have spent three weeks on a bus tour with three Christian bands, speaking to audiences, Denise Gutwein said.

“It's just a remarkable story and it's just so inspiring,” said Mayor Craig Vejvoda, who has heard Austin Gutwein speak at his Rotary Club and at a convention in Monterey.

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