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Forum Health names new board chairman
The best opportunity for Forum to survive and thrive is as one system, he says.
YOUNGSTOWN — Walter J. “Buzz” Pishkur, president and chief executive officer for Aqua Ohio, has been named chairman of the Forum Health board of directors for 2008-09.
Pishkur, whose term is from June 1 of this year to June 1, 2010, has been on the board since June 2004.
He replaced Parry Hesselman, who was interim board chairman from Jan. 1 to May 31, 2008, and remains as a board member. Hesselman replaced Thomas Hollern.
Pishkur, of Boardman, has been a member of the board of directors of the financially troubled Forum Health for three years, and has been an advisory board member of St. Elizabeth Hospital in Danville, Ill., a Forum spokeswoman said.
Pishkur and his family have a long association with Forum Health and its hospitals. He has four sisters who work at Forum Health and his father is a retiree of Trumbull Memorial Hospital in Warren.
Forum’s other major facilities are Northside Medical Center in Youngstown and Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital in Howland.
In a statement from Forum, Pishkur said he “shares the board’s vision of assuring that Forum Health will be the preferred health care system in the communities we serve through a commitment to healing, access, technology and education.”
“I am pleased that as chairman of the board I will be able to help implement decisions that will improve the quality of life, not only in our local communities, but throughout the state of Ohio,” he said.
“Forum’s strength is the quality of patient care provided by its medical professionals, nurses and support staff, and I believe the best opportunity for Forum to not only survive but thrive in the current health care market is for these highly skilled care providers to come together as one system rather than operating as two separate hospitals,” said Pishkur of Northside and TMH.
Pishkur, a Hubbard native, has 39 years experience in the water utility industry. He was named president of Aqua Ohio in August 1992, and president of Aqua Pennsylvania-Shenango in 1999. As such, he has overall responsibility for operation of the companies and their six operating divisions, which provide service to nearly 380,000 residents in 13 counties.
He is a cum laude graduate of The Ohio State University School of Business and an honors graduate of the University of Illinois, receiving a master’s in business administration.
Pishkur is the 2008 chairman of the Youngstown-Mahoning Valley United Way campaign, and has served as a board member of the National City Bank Northeast Advisory Board of Directors. He has been a director for the Youngstown Country Club and chairman of the Youngstown-Warren Regional Chamber, and was chairman in 2004 and 2005 of the American Health Association heart walks.
In addition, he was appointed to Ohio’s Private Water Systems Advisory Board in 2007.
alcorn@vindy.com