Less than two weeks before the planned opening for Doctors Hospital, Altru Health System has purchased it. Altru also announced its plans to expand to the space on South Washington Street. The 65-bed facility is now a thing of the past, before it even opened. The announcement was made shortly after 2 p.m. Friday Feb. 17th, and Doctors Hospital employees were told to have all of their belongings cleared out just three hours later. “After an unprecedented growth in our medical group, Altru Health System is announcing today a major expansion,” Altru CEO Dave Molmen said. “We’ll also include the acquisition of property on the south end of Grand Forks that is owned by the Aurora group,” Molmen said. That property includes the clinic, strip mall and Doctors Hospital. This will relieve congestion at the Columbia campus and allow Altru to continue to serve patients during construction. This isn’t the first time Altru has considered moving into Aurora Medical Park. “In late 2010, we were approached by representatives of the owners of facilities on Aurora med park to see if we would be interested in acquiring those facilities and we took a look at them over a year ago and because we hadn’t completed our planning at that time, we just didn’t know how we would make use of them and so we declined to make an offer for the facilities at that time,” Altru Chief Planning Executive Dennis Reisnour said. But now, with just weeks before the opening of Doctors Hospital, the time was right for Altru. Altru’s plans aren’t completely finished, but officials say it will likely have primary care services and a walk-in clinic at the Aurora Medical Park. I think many members of the Grand Forks community were happy to have a new hospital, owned by someone other than Altru coming to town. The opportunity to choose was going to be an option for Grand Forks, and now that option has been taken away. I had a chance to interact on many occasions with the Doctors Hospital administrative team and they were a great group of people who had great foresight for Grand Forks and the medical offerings they were bringing to our community. Now once again the stranglehold continues in the Grand Forks medical sector.
WDAZ-TV
judge issues restraining order against City Council member
On Tuesday January 17, 2012 Federal Judge Dennis O’Brien issued a restraining order from the bench of United States Bankruptcy Court, District of Minnesota against Grand Forks City Council Member, and District 43 North Dakota Legislator Curt Kreun. Listed on the restraining order with Council Member Kreun is New Stream Real Estate, LLC which is part of New Stream Capital, a Hedge Fund based in Richfield, Connecticut. The restraining order was issued in regards to the Douglas Place Inc. Treatment Facility located in East Grand Forks, MN who filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection back in November of 2011. Council Member Kreun served as Board President of Douglas Place from 2008 until November 2011. The restraining order prohibits Council Member Kreun from “exercising any control over any assets or operations of The Douglas Place, Inc.” and from “contacting and/or interfering with any employees, officers, directors, and/or agents of The Douglas Place, Inc.” This information was acquired while researching a story for an update on the status of Douglas Place and its recent bankruptcy filing back in 2011.
Grand Forks to Host Class B Basketball Tournament
In just a couple of weeks, on March 1, Grand Forks will host the North Dakota State Class B Basketball tournament at the Alerus Center. More than 7,500 fans are expected to pour into the Alerus Center to watch the biggest event Grand Forks will host this year.
For a town that’s rich in hockey tradition, Grand Forks is taking its first stab at a different sport for a weekend. “This is our opportunity to distinguish ourselves a bit as a basketball community,” said Grand Forks Activities Director, Todd Olson. Even people who don’t know players in the tournament, are coming to watch the top 8 high school teams in the state battle it out for the championship. With that many people coming to Grand Forks to see the top eight teams across the state battle it out to be crowned the Class B 2012 Champions we can expect a very positive impact to the economy as well. Although the lights are off right now, people will be surprised at the transformation the Alerus center makes into an arena. Even though it’s not the ideal location like Bismarck or Minot, the atmosphere the Grand Forks community brings to the table is one the Class B basketball tournament has never had before. The conventions and visitors bureau has made tens of thousands of flyers and posters to let the people of Grand Forks know how important this event is. “Class B basketball has long been the most popular tournament that we’ve had, the old saying everyone leaves town, the last one shuts off the lights and that’s how basketball is viewed in rural North Dakota,” said Olson. Todd Olson, the person in charge of this tournament says, the Class B tournament is harder to get to more so than the Class A or other tournaments in the state.
Source:WDAZ-TV