FAMILIAR FACE—Debi Schultze, the new director of the Simi Valley Hospital Foundation, served as the founding chair of the foundation eight years ago. In addition to fundraising, Schultze believes her mission is to educate the community on all that the hospital has to offer. IRIS SMOOT/Acorn Newspapers For Debi Schultze, working at the Simi Valley Hospital is more than a job—it’s personal.

Her two youngest sons were born at the hospital and her eldest son’s life was saved by an emergency room doctor who knew that a sore shoulder could be more than a minor softball injury; in this case it was a severed liver.

Eight years ago Schultze served as the founding chair of the Simi Valley Hospital Foundation board of directors.

From 2002 to 2005, the longtime Simi resident guided the board. Five years later, she now heads the hospital’s fundraising efforts as its new foundation director and chief development officer.

Before taking the job at the hospital, Schultze was president and CEO of the United Chambers of Commerce of the San Fernando Valley and Region, a coalition of 34 business organizations that advocate on the federal, state and local level.

Schultze began her new duties Jan. 4, and after a month on the job, her office feels like home. All in all, she is excited to be back.

“It feels wonderful to be back,” she said. “It feels like I’ve come full circle.”

Hospital President and CEO Darwin Remboldt said he brought on Schultze for much the same reason he hired Councilmember Michelle Foster as the new marketing director last December.

“We thought it was very important to have a local person that knew the community to join the hospital,” he said. “She is very personable; she knows the community well, so we think she is going to do a real good job.”

Schultze, a retired licensed vocational nurse, decided she was ready to pursue her passion for fundraising and healthcare.

“I do enjoy fundraising, and I do enjoy working with people for a common cause, so this really blends everything for me,” said Schultze, who moved to Simi with her husband, Greg, after getting her nursing license in 1978.

“It blends my passion for wanting to care for people and serve people. It stimulates me by having a capital campaign and having to raise money.”

Schultze has a breadth of experience in drumming up money, including fundraising for her kids’ sports groups, running her own nonprofit and coordinating former Assemblymember Keith Richman’s campaign for state treasurer, for which she raised $900,000 of the campaign’s $1.2 million budget.

She said all these experiences have prepared her for her new job. Though the reason for raising the funds is different now—maintaining the state-of-theart hospital and providing residents a chance to give back—it’s still all about building relationships.

In the five years since she left her volunteer position on the board, much has changed at the hospital—for the better. Schultze called the changes “phenomenal” given the current economy, noting that the number of people who attend the foundation’s Hats Off to Women event has grown from 80 at the first conference to 300 last spring.

The foundation was also able to give more than $800,000 worth of equipment to the hospital in 2009, using funds that had been raised over the years.

“It’s just heartwarming to see the growth and the participation from the community,and even the employees and doctors,” Schultze said.

She said the No. 1 goal in forming the foundation was to reach out to the community and let residents know what the hospital provides. While she believes the hospital has done a good job improving its reputation, she said she will continue that mission as director.

“I feel that really my main charge besides raising funds for the hospital is to really educate the community,” she said. “Because I’ve been here for 31 years, I’ve seen the difference. I know what it was like in the ’80s versus now when I come into a beautiful lobby.”

Also on her plate is a five-year capital campaign to raise $3 million for the expansion and renovation of the hospital’s emergency department, which will enlarge the ER by 5,500 square feet and double the number of patient beds from 10 to 20.

In December, Adventist Health, the hospital’s parent corporation, approved a grant of $38 million so that the hospital can start work on Phase 2 of its slated improvements, which includes building the new ER, a cardiac catheterization lab, a new surgery suite and a larger home for gastrointestinal services.

With the grant, Adventist challenged the hospital to raise $3 million more to help pay for the expansion of the emergency room. While every item on the list of Phase 2 improvements is important, Remboldt has said that the hospital’s most pressing need is the expansion of the emergency department.

“Everyone has an interest in having a strong emergency department,” Remboldt said. “I think the statement the community makes by making a pledge to help build the ER is the same one as Adventist: We believe in the hospital.”

Schultze said one benefit of the current healthcare debate is that it has brought more awareness to the fact that hospitals often don’t have sufficient funding to provide the services patients require.

At a time when many hospital emergency rooms are closing because of the financial toll from treating the uninsured, Schultze said it is important to give back.

“We have the physicians; we have the caregivers,” she said. “Most of those people are part of our community, so we need to invest in them so that they can then in turn give us the best healthcare services.”