Tanory

CANYON CITY — Kristine Tanory will likely keep her seat on the Blue Mountain Hospital District Board of Directors.

Tanory was outpolling Deborah Morris 503 to 483 for the Position 3 seat on the board in early unofficial results in the special district election on Tuesday, May 16.

Board members Nick Stiner, Tim Unterwegner and Amy Kreger, all running unopposed, were also reelected.

Tanory, a 57-year-old health care compliance investigator, was appointed in June to fill an open seat on the seven-member board and will now serve a full four-year term. In her candidate statement to the newspaper, she said she wanted to “help find the balance between access to needed services and financial stability, while allowing the personalized care that our provider community delivers to remain intact.”

Morris, 68, filed to run for the same seat but pulled out of the race in mid-April because she had just been hired as director of nursing at Blue Mountain Hospital. The hospital district board’s bylaws prohibit district employees from serving on the body.

But the ballots had already been printed, so her name still appeared as a candidate alongside Tanory’s, and she received almost as many votes in the early results.

The Blue Mountain Hospital District board oversees the district’s operations and is responsible for hiring and supervising the district’s chief executive officer.

The hospital district is a publicly funded taxing district with approximately 250 employees. In addition to Blue Mountain Hospital, it also runs the Strawberry Wilderness Community Clinic, Blue Mountain Care Center and Blue Mountain Home Health and Hospice Agency.