The future of the hospital in Mexico is pending as Boone Health looks for a partner in the business venture, but the Mexico City Council made some decisions on the disposition of the cancer wing at the medical complex at the July 28 meeting.

City Manager Bruce Slagle said the city has to work in a phased approach because of the scale of the site in order to bring the complex back to a buildable, ready site. A number of issues need to be dealt with, he said, and a large number of challenges were not anticipated going into the process, such as leftover records left in the facility, nuclear waste in some machines and  management of some underground storage tanks. The records and nuclear waste have been dealt with, and the county is working on the storage tanks, Slagle said.

“Each step it seems like there is always something more than we ever anticipated, and as a government agency we are bound to follow the rules - it’s just that simple,” he said. 

He said in the first phase, officials must grapple with is abatement, which involves asbestos, hazardous materials, universal waste and infectious and medical waste. Demolition comes in two proposed phases: demolishing the Stribling House and Cornerstone Building and a site restoration, and the second phase involves the demolition of AMC Complex and site restoration. A project summary from the city, regarding restoration, stated that the intent is to have a build-ready site for the area in each demolition phase once it is complete. The abatement process of removing hazardous materials and performing other work has been advertised, and bids will be accepted until Aug. 27. The project summary from the city stated that the bidding of demolition of phase one likely would  come in October and work would begin in November, and the bid for the phase two likely would be in December and the completion date in mid-2026.

Phase two would come after phase one, and officials are awaiting Boone Health’s evaluation of some of the pieces of the AMC building, to see whether Boone officials want to keep components, Slagle said. 

Slagle said the abatement process would go forward in the next few months, and he said council members on July 28 needed to decide about disposition of the cancer wing, whether it would be saved or demolished, and then authorization to spend money in this process. 

“As you remember in the budget, we have budgeted $750,000 in this current year’s budget and in next year’s total budget to do these projects and assist the county with this,” Slagle said. “And that’s what we agreed to (do) in the last year to do all these things.”

After some discussion about the cancer wing and other aspects of the project, council member Vicki Briggs made a motion to save the cancer wing from demolition and secure and stabilize it for a future city hall, and that would pull it out of demolition and abatement, as far as bidding procedures. Council member Ron Ray seconded the motion, but the motion died after Mayor Steve Haag and council member Larry Webber were opposed. Because Chairman Pro Tem Chris Miller was absent, the motion died because it was a 2-2 vote.

Ray then made a motion to remove the cancer wing from the abatement phases at this time and to secure the building. Briggs seconded the motion and Haag and Webber also approved, with the vote being 4-0.

In an email, Haag explained the abatement process is to ensure that all hazardous material is gone before a structure is demolished, and he also discussed the future of the cancer wing building. 

“We removed the cancer wing for now because we are developing a future plan for a possible new city hall,” he said. “Before the hospital was bought, we had looked at the building from the ground up. In today’s market, building new is very expensive. With the possibility of having the cancer wing becoming city hall, it brings the cost of a new city hall significantly down. So as of now we are going to forgo abatement of this building as we work out details for the possibility of a new city hall. The city staff and council will continue to investigate and decide what will be best for the city, city hall, and the cancer wing.”