Tenor Health asks Luzerne County to serve as conduit for tax-exempt bonds to buy Wilkes-Barre General; council presses tax and oversight questions

Tenor Health Foundation representatives told Luzerne County Council they intend to buy Wilkes-Barre General Hospital and asked the hospital authority and county to serve as a conduit for tax-exempt municipal bonds to finance the purchase.

At a work-session presentation, Radha Savatallah, Tenor’s chief executive, said Tenor treats acquired hospitals as community assets and would create a community board, recruit clinicians and reinvest in equipment and operations. "We will hire substantially all of the employees that are in good standing at the time of the closing, and we are aiming to close the transaction here in December," Tenor’s team said during the presentation.

Cain Brothers, the authority’s financial adviser, said it has identified a lender (Rosemar Asset Management) prepared to acquire both tax-exempt and taxable series of bonds if the council and authority complete…