ANNAPOLIS, Md. -- The troubled Prince George's Hospital Center will be taken over by a county-state authority and then sold to a private company.

Under an agreement announced Thursday, the 268-bed hospital and three other facilities now owned by Prince George's County and run by a nonprofit company will be sold outright.

The hospital center includes a main campus in Cheverly, the 96-bed Laurel Regional Hospital, the Bowie Health Center, an emergency care center, and the 107-bed Gladys Spellman Nursing Center. The system is currently managed by Dimensions Healthcare Inc.

The hospital has come close to shutting its doors several times in recent years because it serves many patients too poor to pay. The system treats about 180,000 patients a year.

The agreement calls for an authority of seven people to be set up to sell the hospital. Half of the members will be appointed by County Executive Jack Johnson and half of the members will be appointed by Gov. Martin O'Malley, with a final member appointed by the General Assembly.

The proposed authority will head to lawmakers in the form of amendments to an existing bill about the hospital. Supporters from Prince George's County said they anticipated the bill would be an easy sell, even in a cooling economy that gives lawmakers fewer dollars to spend.

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"We have an obligation to provide health care for citizens," said Democratic Sen. Anthony Muse of Prince George's County. "It will at least move away from being a state-supported hospital."

Lawmakers set aside $50 million last fall to save the hospital, and the deal calls for that money to be used until the hospital is sold.

The agreement would have the authority agree within 60 days how much to spend to transfer the hospital to a new owner. The state and county would agree to spend at least $12 million each in the next year to Dimensions Healthcare System. A takeover plan would be due in January for final state approval, after which time the land and the hospital facilities would be sold.

O'Malley, who announced the agreement in a State House ceremony flanked by county officials, called the Prince George's Hospital Authority a "long-term solution" to stop a series of public subsidies keeping hospital doors open.

O'Malley called current management of the hospital, Maryland's second-busiest trauma center, "just kind of taping it together, one year to the next."

"We were committed to making sure this hospital stayed open," said Prince George's County Executive Jack Johnson, who said government agencies have spent $70 million over the past five years trying to keep the hospital afloat.

Some hospital employees attended the announcement to cheer the news. They were especially happy to hear the authority will be instructed to find a buyer willing to work on a recruiting good doctors and nurses.

"It's hard to attract doctors and nurses to a hospital we don't know if has a future," said Linda Bock, a registered nurse at the Senior Health Center in Brentwood.

Bock's sister, registered nurse Rita Jensen, said uncertainty at the hospital has soured employee morale and also patient care, with equipment across the system out of date because hospital managers weren't sure whether the hospital would close.

"It's like, why fix up your house if you're going to move?" said Jensen, a hospital nurse who has interviewed for other nursing jobs as far away as Hawaii.

A group of religious leaders in Prince George's County held a press conference on Thursday morning before the announcement at which they urged lawmakers not to close the hospital center.

The leaders also called on government officials to upgrade the regional system to a five-star health center.

"The inability of elected officials to address these systemic concerns will have a widespread impact throughout the county," said the Rev. Jonathan Weaver of Greater Mt. Nebo African Methodist Episcopal Church.

Leaders at the conference, which was also attended by parishioners, said they are tired of talk and demanded action.

"We're not sure that the county or state have done what they should have done. We shouldn't be in this kind of position of panicking about this hospital," said the Rev. Perry Smith III of First Baptist Church Inc.

Religious leaders said they represent the health concerns of more than 250,000 county residents, and they hope a real solution comes out of talks between the county and state leaders.

"We're hopeful. We're grateful that they are talking. For a long time there was some friction between to the two groups," said Rev. John K. Jenkins Sr. of the First Baptist Church of Glen Arden. "We hope that the faith community coming together like we have helps to push them along the line of working together for the interests of this region."