Port balks at request to enter hospital district

Commissioners of the Port of Whitman County balked last week at a request to annex the port’s new industrial park into the Pullman Regional Hospital District.

Commissioners worried the hospital’s tax levy would increase land development prices and discourage potential tenants for their new, 35-acre industrial park at the southwest corner of Highway 27 and the Pullman-Albion Road.

Tenants at port sites lease land from the port and pay a leasehold tax equivalent to what tax levies would be on the property.

“My personal opinion is anyone that’s going to be situated in an area that’s serviced by a hospital should have to help pay for that hospital,” said Commissioner John Love.

But Love later worried increased land rates might be too expensive for some potential tenants.

Commissioner Dan Boone recalled the rejection of a hospital annexation request by landowners in the unincorporated county surrounding Pullman.

The annexation request from the hospital included the port, land owned by the Mader family and other landowners nearby.

Those same parcels were annexed into Pullman city limits last year.

The large parcel of land owned by the Mader family was annexed with designs on developing it for housing.

Love noted VMRD, a firm which produces veterinary diagnostic equipment in a plant located next to the port’s new industrial park, last year asked the port to support a measure locking in current city taxes and regulations on its land before it was annexed into the city limits.

Love suggested commissioners consult with VMRD before agreeing to the annexation.

Commissioners agreed to reconsider the annexation request at their next meeting, April 21.

The hospital would need the approval of owners of 60 percent of the land within the area to annex it into the district.

The port purchased the property for $330,000 with a portion of a $1 million Innovation Partnership Zone funding it received from the state in 2007.