COMMUNITY LEADERS, LAWMAKERS PUSH PRITZKER TO REOPEN WEISS, WEST SUBURBAN HOSPITALS

COMMUNITY LEADERS, LAWMAKERS PUSH PRITZKER TO REOPEN WEISS, WEST SUBURBAN HOSPITALS

Neighborhood Residents: Black, Brown, Asian, Low-Income Working Communities Demand Role In Bid to Save Facilities


North and West Side advocates are pushing Gov. J.B. Pritzker to use his official powers to quickly reopen two important Chicago-area hospitals that have closed in the past 11 months: Weiss Memorial Hospital in the Uptown neighborhood of Chicago and West Suburban Medical Center in Oak Park.


The closures have left thousands without a nearby emergency room or hospital-based care. Among them are many immigrants, refugee families, and people with low income, impacting the most vulnerable communities in already-underserved communities.


The shutdowns have created a months-long health crisis, say community groups serving those residents. The shutdowns have left hundreds of hospital workers without reliable income, with many still waiting for overdue back pay. Now the Coalition to Save Safety Net Hospitals is demanding that community groups have a say in reopening the hospitals, and they want the State to act fast.


“These are our neighbors, our elders, our children,” said Rev. Robin Hood, coalition member and founder of Mothers Opposed to Violence Everywhere, or M.O.V.E. “For decades they trusted Weiss and West Suburban to be there when they were scared and hurting. To close that door and tell them to fend for themselves is not just bad policy, it is a failure of our duty to care for one another. We owe these families better.”


“The state is responsible for overseeing public services such as hospitals so we are calling on the Governor to treat this like the public health emergency that it is,” said Linh “Lilly” Le, community organizing director of the Vietnamese Association of Illinois. “The state has failed hundreds of families and seniors who lost their hospitals. It’s clear that better oversight and better management of these hospitals are needed.”


The coalition is calling on the state to:

Hold an immediate meeting with Gov. Pritzker and the state health agencies with the Coalition to Save Safety Net Hospitals and the affected communities and ensure that the community has a formal role in decisions about the hospitals' future.

Move to reopen both hospitals under new, responsible ownership, using the leverage the state holds as a major creditor and through its oversight of hospital ownership.

Require community input into processes for reviewing extensions and decision-making, and require a credible, funded reopening plan as a condition for any further state support.


The owners Resilience Healthcare are battling each other in court for control of the company and the hospitals. The case has produced allegations and denials of misused finances and unpaid millions owed to the state. As the legal fight continues, a state oversight board on July 21 granted Resilience a six-month extension of its suspension of services at Weiss. Board staff had told the panel it could attach conditions to ensure accountability, but board members approved the extension with none, and no community members were in the room to weigh in.


That decision angered members of the Coalition to Save Safety Net Hospitals, who said the extension was granted without input from the communities most affected by the closures.


During the extension request, Resilience's attorney told the state board that the company wants to wait out its appeal of Weiss' Medicare termination, along with a state effort to recoup more than $27 million in unpaid taxes and fees, before deciding the hospital's future. Coalition members call that a plan to run out the clock, not a plan to reopen.


“The state now has a responsibility to help put both hospitals into responsible hands,” said Shannon Bennett, executive director of the Kenwood-Oakland Community Organization, or KOCO. KOCO is a member of the Coalition to Save Safety Net Hospitals.


“This is the canary in the coal mine,” said Marc Kaplan, an organizer with coalition member Northside Action for Justice. “What happened at Weiss and West Suburban is going to happen to safety-net hospitals across this city and this country, and the people who lose their hospital are the ones who can least afford to.”

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