![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/VTD-Bratt-hospital-18-1200x900.jpg\")
A crowd of about 100 people rally July 14 in support of the birthing center at Brattleboro Memorial Hospital. Photo by Kevin O\u2019Connor\/VTDigger<\/p>\nA crowd of about 100 people rally July 14 in support of the birthing center at Brattleboro Memorial Hospital. Photo by Kevin O\u2019Connor\/VTDigger<\/p>\n
State regulators expressed both concern and support as acting administrators at Brattleboro Memorial Hospital outlined plans at a Friday online hearing to curb deficit spending caused by past administrative and accounting problems<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cI do think the Brattleboro community is suffering the consequences of mismanagement at this hospital,\u201d Sara Teachout, one of five members of Vermont\u2019s Green Mountain Care Board, told the facility\u2019s new leaders. \u201cI appreciate what you all are doing to change that.\u201d<\/p>\n The southeastern Vermont healthcare hub, now operating on a $130 million annual budget, is forecasting a $7.1 million shortfall for the coming fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. That would follow operating losses of $33.6 million from fiscal years 2017 through 2025 and an estimated $9.5 million for FY 2026, according to a report<\/a> discussed by regulators Friday.<\/p>\n To cover the deficit spending, the hospital is tapping its reserves of cash, investments and unrestricted assets, the new leaders said. But that has depleted the facility\u2019s collective accounts from $53.3 million in FY 2021 to a projected $19.7 million for FY 2027.<\/p>\n \u201cThe losses have been mounting,\u201d said Elizabeth McLarney, acting co-CEO with fellow doctor Tony Blofson. \u201cWe need to recover financially.\u201d<\/p>\n The 61-bed hospital has operated with acting administrators since former president Christopher Dougherty exited without explanation in November<\/a> and former chief financial officer Laura Bruno departed amid similar silence in December<\/a>.<\/p>\n In their report to regulators, Blofson and McLarney said consultants had discovered \u201csignificant deficiencies\u201d in the hospital\u2019s financial systems. Those, in turn, led to \u201cunhelpful and inaccurate in most cases\u201d accounting assessments and the need to tap into savings to pay staff, taxes and loans.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s kind of death by 1,000 paper cuts \u2014 it\u2019s no one thing or one person,\u201d said David Sanville, the hospital\u2019s financial consultant.<\/p>\n READ MORE<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t The deficit spending has depleted not only the hospital\u2019s savings but also its \u201cdays cash on hand,\u201d which is an estimate of how many days it could stay open if it didn\u2019t reap any outside revenue and had to cover expenses strictly with its own reserves.<\/p>\n Regulators consider a figure of 205 days or more to be \u201cvery strong\u201d and one of 80 days or less to be \u201chighly vulnerable.\u201d According to its report, the hospital has seen its number decrease from 220 days in FY 2021 to 60 days this summer.<\/p>\n \u201cOur first job is to get back to breaking even,\u201d Sanville told reporters in an interview earlier in the week, \u201cand our second job is to start building up that savings.\u201d<\/p>\n To cut costs, the hospital \u2014 one of Brattleboro\u2019s three largest employers \u2014 laid off nine support staffers this month to reduce its annual payroll by about $840,000. After eliminating several long-vacant positions, leaders anticipate the number of employees dropping from 528 full-time equivalents in the current budget to 457 in the coming one.<\/p>\n The hospital also plans to save money by closing its birthing center<\/a> by Dec. 31 if it can\u2019t find a long-term way to cover an estimated annual unit loss of $4.8 million \u2014 half of the hospital\u2019s projected overall FY 2026 deficit. Declining the suggestion of a municipal subsidy<\/a>, leaders are hoping to receive a Rural Health Transformation government grant or approval of a recent clinicians\u2019 call<\/a> to raise Medicaid obstetric reimbursement rates \u2014 both now under review by the state Agency of Human Services.<\/p>\n Even with such measures, the hospital is projecting a seventh consecutive year of deficit spending in FY 2027 and doesn\u2019t anticipate breaking even on an overall annual budget until FY 2028 at the earliest.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve been making steady progress,\u201d Sanville said, \u201cbut there\u2019s a lot to address.\u201d<\/p>\n Brattleboro\u2019s review came on the last day of the care board\u2019s annual budget hearing process for Vermont\u2019s 14 community hospitals. Regulators have spent two weeks listening to administrators from the Burlington-based University of Vermont Health<\/a> and smaller facilities statewide elaborate on the challenges of balancing rising expenses with revenue.<\/p>\n The care board is expected to rule on whether to approve, modify or deny spending plans by Sept. 15.<\/p>\n This is the second year that regulators have expressed worry about the Brattleboro hospital\u2019s finances.<\/p>\n \u201cStated as directly as possible, we are deeply concerned about BMH\u2019s solvency,\u201d the care board wrote<\/a> after last year\u2019s review process.<\/p>\n Regulators last fall ordered the hospital to recalculate its current budget<\/a> or risk becoming the first to receive a state-appointed monitor under a new law<\/a> adopted to control costs. After seeing the revisions over the winter, regulators limited their response to a warning<\/a>, although they can still call for some sort of intervention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A crowd of about 100 people rally July 14 in support of the birthing center at Brattleboro Memorial…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":814321,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[124354,77107,97,252,253,141652],"class_list":["post-814320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-brattleboro-memorial-hospital","tag-green-mountain-care-board","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-uvm-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=814320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814320\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/814321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=814320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=814320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=814320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t![\"Brattleboro](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/VTD-Bratt-hospital-17-1200x900.jpg\")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n