As you may have seen in the local press or my articles here, I have offered an amendment to this year’s budget to hopefully reopen Crozer Hospital. To be very clear, I am aware of no other plan to open the hospital.

Recap of the Plan

· I introduced an amendment to the state budget to create a $200 million Hospital Acquisition Assistance Fund. The goal is to offer one-time grant money to help potential buyers with the purchase and reopening of closed hospitals across the Commonwealth—most urgently, Crozer.

· Because this is an amendment to this year’s budget, constitutionally we must draw from existing funds without adding a new expenditure.

· My amendment draws from the Medical Assistance Capitation Fund (state Medicaid payments to hospital systems) for the next year, but it is immediately replaced by drawing on a huge unspent surplus of previous years monies in that fund. More specifically, over the last three years, more than $450 million have gone unspent. Eventually, that almost half a billion dollars will be returned to the General Fund, unspent for its intended purposes.

Urgency

We must move with haste. I spoke to the brokerage firm tasked by the bankruptcy court to sell the real estate property. They see merit in our plan, but their chief concern is urgency. Their primary task is to discharge debts in bankruptcy by getting as much money from the sale of the real estate as they are able. Their discretion to sell to a lower-bidding hospital system is limited if there exists a higher offer from someone else. As explained to me, that means a developer could place the highest bid and then destroy the hospital for other purposes. The sale could be a matter of weeks and likely no more than two months away.

Healthcare Consequences in Delaware County

I am also in touch with the Chief of Radiation Oncology for Crozer. Her practice is currently closed at all locations, which means all of her cancer patients must be seen elsewhere. She has helped me understand the badly shifting healthcare availability in Delaware County by analyzing online reports from the Delaware County Department of Health.

• Emergency Room wait times have jumped from 22 minutes to 53 minutes in just one month at the nearest hospital

• 20 percent of Delco residents now live more than 5 miles from a hospital (up from 4 percent)

• Crozer ran 14 ambulances. Delaware County has short-term coverage only until August 3, after which 25 municipalities must have their own EMS plans (and many have been making those plans.)

• Delaware County no longer has a behavioral health inpatient crisis center

Dispelling Myths

Myth: the $200 million one-time grant fund uses much needed medical assistance.

Truth: to say the Hospital Acquisition Assistance Fund uses medical assistance for funding is at best a half-truth. It does pull from the Medical Assistance Capitation line item of the budget, but that line item is sitting on almost a half billion dollars of unused money from three previous budgets which will immediately backfill the $200 million grant fund.

Myth: just another Republican who wants to give a bailout to private equity to rob of us of our money and hospital again.

Truth: this claim is gross political “whataboutism” to shoot down the idea on purely partisan grounds. I have offered a nonpartisan idea to save much needed healthcare in Delaware County.

And, just last month, we passed House Bill 1460, which would allow the Pennsylvania Attorney General to review and perhaps block the sale of a hospital to private equity and other for-profit entities. I voted for that bill. I spoke on behalf of that bill. In fact, I voted for an even stronger version of that bill in the last session of the House. The Governor came to Delaware County to promote it; I was standing there with him in unison. The legislation now sits in the PA Senate awaiting action.

Local officials had these things to say about passage of that bill:

“Private equity has no place in healthcare,” said Delaware County Council Chair Dr. Monica Taylor. “While Prospect Medical Holdings may have turned their back on our community, our County team and—crucially—our Delco delegation in the General Assembly never has and never will. I’m proud we have people like them to serve our residents.”

“”Not long ago, our county had 6 great hospitals to serve our 576,000 residents,” said Delaware County Council Vice-Chair Richard Womack.   “Now we have just two. It’s no coincidence that those two remaining hospitals are non-profits. Healthcare should not be a for-profit industry, and I support the work of our Delco delegation to protect our residents.”

“My thanks go out to our Delaware County delegation in Harrisburg, and not just to Rep. Borowski but to

everyone who co-sponsored and supported this legislation,” said Delaware County Council Member Kevin Madden. “The County can’t respond to this crisis on our own, and luckily, we don’t have to. Our delegation has been steadfast partners through this entire transition, and I’m proud we have them in our corner.”

So, we need two things to happen to open Crozer – passage of the bill in the Senate to restrain private equity from gouging our healthcare systems to line their pockets and a funding source to help buyers from beneath the mountain of debt accumulated by private equity.

I have seen no other plan.