Bill Call wrote:Jim O'Bryan wrote:
The Crain communication article. "The Clinic's vision The city and the Lakewood Hospital
Association insist their soul-searching over the hospital's future wasn't at the Clinic's urging."
The only way I can read that is, the Clinic was prepared to continue on, and the City knew it.
That's worth thinking about. Can it be it really is all about looting the treasury? My words not yours but that is the implication.
I guess it is possible someone at City Hall thinks some kind of "new development" is better than access to medical care and 1,100 jobs. I asked if anyone is that clever. Is the better question: Is anyone that stupid?
I can't think of one development project that would be worth the loss of a first class medical facility.
If they have such a grand idea why didn't they buy the Lakewood Center building when it went into foreclosure? I think if sold for under $5 million.
Bill
I hate defending the people that caused this debacle, funny how often those words are
associated with a couple of these folks. One it rolls off his tongue like "good morning."
I believe, and this is my opinion, that some were looking out for Lakewood's future, some saw a goldmine of economic development money they could attach themselves to, as they have all too often in the past in this town. Then, as I have reported for nearly a decade, they will come up short, screw the thing up, and then give each other awards and move on to the next pile of loot, or as some have said, retire in Pittsburgh or Cape Cod.
Like I said, we have a couple groups with well-meaning people but some on the list are more than suspect, and they tend to be the bullies of the pack. One might wonder how over 40 people together get a package like this, and come to unanimous agreement in under 36 hours? When you speak with them, they all say the same thing in a kind of Stepford wife moment: "Healthcare is changing."
I believe they had a timelime, unveiling their secret master plan in June. By then, they would have the crisis team in place. The "Active Living Task Force" would come back with their faux study of needing a rec center. If you speak to the members it was heavily filled with rec center wanters. Which is not illegal. Then would come the announcement of the Hospital leaving, which one of the parties was ready to make last fall, so as to be honest with the people of Lakewood. The Mayor would roll out this miracle cure for losing the hospital: A new rec center, no rec center natatorium*, no-- wellness center, no-- health center, no-- active living hub.... City Council would have passed the charter amendment allowing them to close down the Hospital Board, freeing Lakewood Hospital Foundation to repurpose and reform themselves with a vote of the majority to "health and/or economic development" the mayor's words, you have the perfect storm. $100+ million in the bank, and a task force saying the people demand a rec center, and 4.1 acres for more economic development in the now empty DowntowN area, with a repurposed Foundation doling out our $100 million to friends and pet projects while taking Cleveland Foundation-style salaries for doing it.
But what do I know? I have only been talking about this, well, since we started the paper.
And this latest scheme for about two years.
Bill you went public after you noticed a fall off in services and you had to go to Westlake
for tests that were offered here years ago.
Matt Markling went public LOUDLY after hearing the Mayor and Dru Siley went to the School Board and made the presentation for a rec center and the tax raise. The now infamous Michael P. Summers Rec Center and Natatorium*. However the tax raise proposed was not to build the Center, but to make up for lost taxes, as they knew their plan would not create taxes just a rec center needing huge sums of cash to stay afloat.
I went public after rumors of over 2 years came together "with the timeline." If you go back and look at all of Bill Call's ranting and ravings about the hospital leaving, you will see me ask again and again about the timelime. When the Cleveland Clinic closed Huron Road, there was a timeline.
I broke the story after talking with two elected officials about the now solid rumors coming out, and asked them both if they had heard anything. Both said they had heard nothing from the board, which alarmed me. It alarmed me even more when I found out that both of them were ON the board. One of the many rumors around this was that the Clinic was no longer returning Mayor Summers calls. Fearing we were going to lose our largest employer, I went public.
Immediately, two people on the Board, and elected officials came forward in a much larger media outlet, which was stupid, to lie and try to cover up and dismiss the story they knew to be true, as lies and not true.
From that time on, I have had many friends called by some of the players in this begging them to tell me to take down the post, take back my words and tell everyone I was lying. Well I was not. I have had colleagues bullied, I have had advertisers called, and many of my "friends" stop talking to me because I am a troublemaker.
And now we get to the real sad part of all of this. The Crisis Management, the cover up, and the nasty emails, and peer pressure that has made this town a living hell at times. Good people being forced to keep quiet because their son or daughter plays soccer, or mom is friends with so and so and the sewing group doesn't want to lose whatever. So you end up with three "wackos" who speak freely because they will not give in to the intimidation and peer pressures other feel, talking openly, while everyone has had their voices shuttered.
OPINION - Someone climbed on the bus of good hard-working Lakewood Citizens and fed them some BS from BS consultants, and explained to those on the Board that "Health Care is changing!" and got into the driver's seat and hijacked them all.
FACT - The hospital is leaving.
FACT - We are losing 1,100 jobs, worst case. Best case, 800.
FACT - The Cleveland Clinic has offered $82 million to the Board, Foundation, City.
FACT - If $82 million is coming to the City it should not be in the hands of a private board that is not accountable to the citizens of Lakewood.
FACT - We have 90 days to act on it.
FACT - We need to know how the hell this happened, and who threw the city and the Clinic under the bus for a handful of economic magic beans to play with in DowntowN. But not right now. We have bigger issues right now and a very-- some might say intentionally--short period of time to work them out.
OPINION - Put the funds in a city account, that offers minimum risk, while people who did not cause us to lose the hospital try to figure out WHAT IS BEST FOR THE COMMUNITY not THEMSELVES. Free up Cleveland Clinic from spending the $34 million on a new building, and get them to commit to working with/overseeing a new 2026 version of a community hospital, basically a staging area for locals to deal with medical issues while options are being explored. A hybrid hospital/recovery/hospice place to ease the burden on locals from having to drive, or get someone to drive them, the 12 minutes to Avon.
The ways hospitals get money are complicated, if we could get the Clinic to oversee this new version of a Community Hospital there could be a possibility of getting Tier 1 or Tier 2 status. Without this, a hospital will not survive, that I am pretty sure of. The way hospitals get paid, and where insured people can go is pretty complex. But a Tier 2 hospital gets less for the same operation than a Tier 1 hospital. Then you get into where your insurers will allow you to go, and finally all hospitals insure their own, and most of the municipalities they are in. This is a financial boost to the city, but it also dries up the number of patients you have access to. In Cuyahoga County, MED CITY, you take away the hospital workers, the doctors and their staff, the city workers and teachers, you end up with a very, very small pool of walk-ins. We would need to be Tier 1, or Tier 2 at the very least to make this work.
But what the hell do I know about healthcare, finances, or the city I blindly love?
* Natatorium was added to make it sound even more ridiculous than it did at the meeting.
Love rec Centers or hate them, no one can afford them. They are black holes in a city's
budget. One can argue that cities are not supposed to make money, which is true but they can't lose money. If Solon can't afford theirs, how does Lakewood afford one after losing 1,100 high paying medical jobs? This is why it sounds so ridiculous.
