Keane paid $245,250 in severance from hospital district

NEWPORT – Merry- Ann Keane, the former CEO of Newport Hospital and Health Services, received $245,250 in severance pay after resigning in September.

“Ms. Keane received $245,250 as a severance payment,” hospital district attorney Jenaé Ball wrote in an email to The Miner. “NHHS and Ms. Keane had disputed claims resolved by the severance agreement, and Ms. Keane wanted to live closer to her daughter.”

Keane was also making more as CEO than previously disclosed. The Miner asked for her contract or contracts in a public records request. The Miner eventually received a contract that had Keane earning $235,000 a year.

Interim NHHS CEO Kim Manus said that the contract supplied in the response to the records request was Keane’s original 2022 contract. Hospital district commissioners gave Keane a $47,000 incentive compensation bonus in December 2023, bringing her annual salary to $327,000, but without the option for future incentive pay.

Manus said that a copy of the resolution about Keane’s incentive pay and salary were not placed in Keane’s personnel file, therefore the public records officer didn’t know about it.