We welcome back Kristie Fisher to the Corridor as the new president of Kirkwood Community College. She succeeded Lori Sundberg, who had a successful five years leading this important regional institution.
Ms. Fisher was most recently president of Iowa Valley Community College District in Marshalltown, which she’s served since 2019.
There are a few institutions and businesses that embody the Corridor region as well as Kirkwood. In fact, the region is geographically defined as Kirkwood’s seven-county territory.
Ms. Fisher’s background also embodies the region: growing up in Swisher/Shueyville in the middle of the Corridor, attending Prairie High School, obtaining an associate degree from Kirkwood and a bachelor’s degree and Masters of Business Administration from the University of Iowa, and working for both Kirkwood and ACT in Iowa City. She also received a doctorate in philosophy from Iowa State University.
Ms. Fisher has the potential to become one of those transformative leaders at Kirkwood, but it takes vision, cooperation and longevity. Ms. Fisher is only 52 years old. She was in the very first CBJ Forty Under 40 class in 2005, when she was Kirkwood’s director of Special Projects & Assistant to the President.
We are confident that Ms. Fisher will continue to champion education and workforce, which are foundational to Kirkwood’s mission, and will continue Kirkwood’s tradition of creating win-win-win situations for economic development throughout the region.
We are hopeful that Ms. Fisher will also be a catalyst for more regional cooperation, something that has stagnated over the past several years and continues to be jeopardized by parochial machinations and a lack of leadership.
One-horse town?
The last issue’s editorial on Mercy Iowa City, titled “A community hospital, if you can keep it,” was premature.
It turns out that instead of being acquired out of bankruptcy court by primary secured debt holder Preston Hollow Community Capital, as previously announced, the University of Iowa was the highest bidder at a reported $28 million plus operating expenses.
If the UI is able to get Mercy for that amount, it will prove to be an incredible deal, maybe one of the best business deals in the Corridor in a generation.
While the UI had stated earlier that it would continue to operate Mercy as a community hospital, with the latest announcement that tone has changed to “if the University is approved as the buyer by the bankruptcy court, it says it plans to conduct an in-depth analysis of the health care needs of the Iowa City community before making any modifications to the hospital or its services. In addition, the University intends to make employment offers to substantially all Mercy employees.”
This change might be good for the employees, but could spell the demise of a bonafide community hospital and make Iowa City and Johnson County a one-hospital town. CBJ
