MARSHFIELD, Wis. (WSAU) — Ministry Health Care is filing a lawsuit against the Marshfield City Board of Appeals to try and stop Marshfield Clinic from renovating part of their campus into a hospital.
Marshfield Clinic has been planning to build a new hospital in Marshfield by 2018 and plans to renovate part of the campus area they share with St Joseph’s Hospital to do that. It’s part of a larger series of expansions planned by the Clinic which include that new hospital in Marshfield and expansion into the Eau Claire area.
Marshfield city officials approved that renovation back in July, and Ministry objected to the city’s Zoning Board of Appeals. They say Marshfield Clinic failed to apply for the proper building permits for the project, and that the city needed to issue conditional use permits to allow the change from a clinic to a hospital.
City officials and the Board of Appeals disagreed, and say that turning a clinic into a hospital does not change the basic use of that property under city ordinances.
The Board of Appeals now has 20 days to respond to that lawsuit.
This isn’t the only battle involving the two expanding health care systems. A similar dispute is happening in Minocqua where an expansion of Marshfield Clinic’s facilities was recently rejected by an Oneida County committee over concerns that it would damage public health services at Howard Young Medical Center which is run by Ministry Health Care.
