MUNSTER | State officials had an impromptu meeting Monday at Franciscan Hospital here to talk about the future of Munster Med-Inn.

The facility, which housed 190 nursing home patients, was evacuated Sept. 13 and 14 when floodwaters filled the basement of the facility on Calumet Avenue following three days of steady rain.

Administrator Julian Robinson has said patients are being housed at other facilities in Indiana and Illinois. Munster Med-Inn has 33 patients who are housed at the Franciscan Hospital. Munster Med-Inn staff and hospital staff take care of those patients, he said.

Robinson has said it will be six months before the facility will be able to reopen.

Eric Vermeulen, director of member services and regulatory affairs for the Indianapolis-based Indiana Health Care Association, said Munster Med-Inn intends to reopen, but the issue is whether it gets paid for services while rehabilitation work is ongoing.

"It will depend on how federal and state officials look at the residents. Munster Med-Inn could get paid and, in turn, pay the receiving facilities," he said.

"I know that Julian Robinson also wants to make sure that all of the Medicaid regulations are satisfied and they can stay in business until they reopen. They will have to work through a lot of red tape. They also want to make sure the facilities who have received their residents get paid for the work they do," Vermeulen said.

Vermeulen said Robinson and his staff are to be commended for getting residents to a safe place because it wasn't easy finding places and working through all of the issues.

Robinson could not be reached for comment after the meeting.

Vermeulen participated in the meeting, which included Robinson; state Rep. Mara Candelaria Reardon, D-Munster; Indiana Family and Social Services Secretary Mitch Roob; state Rep. Charlie Brown, D-Gary; state Sen. Frank Mrvan, D-Hammond; and Steve Smith, of the Indiana Health Care Association.

Robinson has said officials intend to make the facility even better than it was before. Of 320 employees, 180 of them have been laid off. Those employees will get health coverage through October.