Chicago’s Uptown and Austin communities have each been down a safety-net hospital for months.
In Uptown, it’s been nearly a year since Weiss Memorial Hospital closed its doors. In Austin, it’s been four months since West Suburban Medical Center on the eastern edge of Oak Park stopped serving patients.
Meanwhile, the two owners of both hospitals have been locked in a bitter legal battle in Cook County court for months.
Stuck on the sidelines are patients like Phong Nguyen.
The 81-year-old Vietnamese refugee and long-time Uptown resident depended on Weiss for years to treat conditions including arthritis and tuberculosis.
“When Weiss closed last August, I was there fighting to reopen this very important hospital,” Nguyen said through a translator during a Tuesday rally at Daley Plaza. “Now, almost a year later, I am still here with my community and neighbors, still fighting for our hospital that we have lost. … I stand with everyone today to make it clear: This is a public health emergency. People’s lives, health and jobs are at stake.”
Nguyen shared his story alongside advocates from the North and West sides who say their already vulnerable communities are facing further harm after losing their safety-net hospitals. They called on Gov. JB Pritkzer to intervene and reopen both hospitals under new management.
Their rally came hours before an afternoon hearing at the Daley Center in the legal fight between Resilience Healthcare chief executive officer Manoj Prasad and the hospital’s landlord, Rathnakar Reddy Patlola.
Lawyers continue to argue over a motion pressing Prasad’s legal team to accept a settlement agreement that was finalized in late May. The motion accuses Prasad of delaying the process. The terms of the settlement are sealed.
“The longer this takes, the harder it’s going to be to reopen these hospitals,” Scott Kaplan, a lawyer for Patlola, said in court Tuesday.
Lawyers for Prasad said they need more time to go over the settlement with him. The next hearing is scheduled for Friday afternoon.
Prasad’s lawyers also said Resilience has settled an outstanding bill of $60,000 with ComEd. The utility had threatened to cut off power at West Suburban and Weiss.
Meanwhile, West Suburban formally laid off 589 employees earlier this month, according to a notice sent to the state. Those employees had been furloughed since late March when the hospital closed.
During the rally, speakers pleaded with Pritzker to help reopen the hospitals.
“Today I call on our state leadership, Gov. Pritzker, to step in and do everything in his power to save our hospitals,” Weiss patient Nguyen said. “Gov. Pritzker, where are you? Meet with us. Work with our communities to address this health crisis.”
Pritzker’s office, in a written statement, said responsibility to reopen the hospitals falls on its owners.
“Despite intensive financial and operational support from the State of Illinois throughout Resilience Health’s tenure, West Suburban and Weiss Hospitals are ultimately private facilities whose leadership was both unable and unwilling to do everything in their power necessary to keep their facilities in operation — and they never presented the State with any formal request or viable plan to continue operations,” Pritzker’s office said.
Advocates also criticized a new state law that requires hospitals to disclose more financial information with state regulators, but not the public.
“Pritzker just signed a law that they’re bragging about, that they say will help have more accountability for these safety-net hospitals towards the state,” said Mark Kaplan of North Side Action for Justice. “One of the very baffling things in this law is that there actually is no right for the public, for us, to see what the finances are. … We don’t believe we can leave it up to the good graces of the state. They’re the ones that got us in this mess.”
Kaplan and others also condemned the recent decision by the Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board to give Resilience more time to improve Weiss before the state permanently revokes its license.
“How do you not hold [Prasad] accountable of what he did the last five years to give him six more months to finish running Weiss down into the ground?” said the Rev. Robin Hood, founder of Mothers Opposed to Violence Everywhere, at the Daley Plaza rally.
“Prasad has been a facade all this time,” Hood added.
