CHC will soon retire its 30-year-old A/C system

The Commonwealth Health Center will soon retire its more than 30-year-old air-conditioning system, according to Division of Public Health and Hospital Emergency Preparedness program director Warren Villagomez.

He said the hospital’s new heat, ventilation, and air-conditioning system is already 65 percent complete and when it finally comes online this June, the hospital will finally realize cost-saving measures on its utilities, a better climate-controlled environment for patient safety, and a more efficient A/C system.

Villagomez said the new HVAC system will also address concerns of past surveys by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that the hospital has been constantly cited for.

JWS Air Condition and Refrigeration Ltd.—which was contracted for the HVAC upgrade in May 2014—is working in the evening or after operation hours to complete the HVAC project.

“Everything is coming along smoothly and we continue [working on the project] every night and pretty much full force in the evening. It starts at 4:30pm and it goes full throttle [until] usually around 2am,” Villagomez said.

JWS is already done with the Division of Public Health Services area, and is now at the clinical ward of the hospital.

Villagomez said that they would start on the rooftop at a later time.

“After everything else is finished in the clinical ward, there is going to be test runs,” he said.

JWS installed ceiling fans and secured installation fittings for all the units of the first floor in November last year.

The immunization and dental clinic area had already been retrofitted with a blower unit, one of the bigger improvements since the start of the project.

CHCC will be looking at a cost savings of between 28 and 34 percent and potentially a major cut in the hospital’s current power bills, Villagomez said in an earlier interview.

CHCC so far has been paying the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. more than $400,000 to $500,000 in utility bills every month.

In an earlier interview, Villagomez noted that they are also changing the north and south elevators that were earlier cited by CMS. As for the other citation—the fire pump—the hospital has staff assigned to monitor it constantly to make sure that safety isn’t compromised.