Cornerstone Family Health Care and Hudson Valley Community Services announced their intent to merge in a press conference last Wednesday morning.

“The Hudson Valley Community Services Board conducted strategic planning,” said Andy Evans, Board Chair of Hudson Valley Community Services. “One of the outcomes of the strategic planning was the decision to find a merging partner that would enhance our services and continue our mission.”

Evans explained that the healthcare group reached out to Cornerstone and found them to be the most compatible for a merger. “Because of this synergy,” said Evans. “We’ll improve and broaden the services we already do.”

The organizations have a letter of intent to merge but do not have a confirmed date for the merger yet.

“The decision to merge our organizations came after many months of due diligence on a part of both wards,” said Wayne Day, Board Chair of Cornerstone Family Healthcare. “The more we got into it [the process for the merger], the more it made more sense to us.”

Both organizations assured that the merger will guarantee the continuation of services that patients and clients have loved and used over the years.

“We’re very happy to see two outstanding organizations come together and provide better healthcare solutions to the region,” said Mike Oates, President of the Hudson Valley Economic Development Corporation.

“As the management of both organizations start to work together, I’m confident that they’ll find both cost savings; they’ll find best practices, and they’ll find better ways to compete in the marketplace.”

“I’m so pleased to see HVCS enter a new phase in its development and growth,” said Andrea Straus, Executive Director of Hudson Valley Community Services.

“We do this because New York State is moving from the traditional way of paying for services from volume to value,” said Linda Muller, President of Cornerstone Family Healthcare. “It means there comes a point in time where there needs to be integrated delivery services that come together.”

Muller emphasized that healthcare needs to have a place where patients and clients have multiple points of access, and where the patient receives the best treatment at a contained cost.

“We will be a truly patient-centric service provider that will have abilities to provide settings that make the most sense for our patients and our clients,” said Muller.