The Observation Deck

Today ex-Congressman Kucinich filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission in Washington, DC, regarding matters concerning Cleveland Clinic and Lakewood Hospital. Attached you will find (1) a release about the filing of the complaint at the FTC; (2) a signed copy of the complaint; and (3) a copy of two documents produced in discovery in Graham v. City of Lakewood which support a request for action by the FTC since Cleveland Clinic is currently removing medical services from Lakewood Hospital and diverting patients. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Download all documents here: http://media.lakewoodobserver.com/media ... 926914.pdf

The Mayor just shit his pants AGAIN

The 21 page, single-spaced filing has over 80 declarations, which note, among other
things:

• The unique status of the “coexistent, coextensive alter ego” of CCF, and the Lakewood Hospital Association, which amended its Code of Regulations in 1997 to make Cleveland Clinic the sole member of the Lakewood Hospital Association, and, as such, gave the Clinic “plenary power…with respect to the Lakewood Hospital Association, and consequently the operations of Lakewood Hospital itself.” CCF controls 19 of 23 seats on the LHA board.

• “CCF/LHA have diverted Lakewood Hospital assets to other CCF properties, stealthily converting city-owned property for their benefit and to the disadvantage of Lakewood Hospital and the community it serves.”

• A Standard and Poor’s Research Report of May 9, 2013, states:Lakewood Hospital “remains outside of the obligated group because it is a government-owned facility tied to CCHS through a long-term lease.”

• In the May 9, 2013 Research Report, Standard and Poor’s cites some underlying facts concerning CCF’s contractual obligations to Lakewood Hospital in what has become a central bone of contention between those who maintain that Lakewood Hospital is losing money and therefore must close, and those residents of Lakewood, plaintiffs in Graham v. City of Lakewood, who insist that any cash shortfalls at Lakewood Hospital, by contract must be covered by Cleveland Clinic: “A contract with Lakewood requires CCF to fund any cash shortfall should one occur. Lakewood’s cash to debt must always equal to at least a 1:1 ration as [sic] the end of its fiscal year. Should losses continue or liquidity decline such that either impede timely payment of remaining debt service, we could lower the rating. “

• “In 2012, Cleveland Clinic, under increasing competitive and market pressures which threated their credit-worthiness, executed a deceptive and anti-competitive strategy through and with its coextensive alter ego, the Lakewood Hospital Association, in order to reduce and ultimately eliminate the tax and trust subsidized
Lakewood Hospital. In doing so the CCF hoped to evade potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in financial obligations it had accepted pursuant to the 1996 Definitive Agreement and Lease between Cleveland Clinic and the Lakewood Hospital Association.”

• “CCF under the pretext of developing a new master plan for its Fairview Hospital…duplicitously and with intent to deceive...[did] develop and execute a secret plan to destroy Lakewood Hospital as a going concern, raze the buildings and merge much of the remaining physical and personnel assets of Lakewood Hospital into the Cleveland Clinic system outside of the City of Lakewood, while cloaking their clandestine activities in the canard of ‘the evolving nature of health care’…”

• “In a deposition dated September 8, 2015, Joseph Strauss, Director of Planning for Cleveland Clinic, when questioned about what would happen to an estimated prospective 10,000 Emergency Department visitors not provided for in the decanting plan. He oopined they could go to Metro Hospital, a twenty-five minute drive,
or the Huron Rd. emergency facility, a thirty-five minute drive.” “At this very moment there is evidence that CCF continues its ‘decanting plan’ by removing medical services from Lakewood Hospital and diverting patients. This is why I filed now with the FTC. The Clinic must understand that the people of Lakewood are not going to stand by idly and see their community hospital taken through illegal means. I am proud to stand for Lakewood as a private citizen, as I have through two years in the State Senate and sixteen years in the US House.”

.

The FTC may be very interested in this case. They have been investigating hospital mergers and consolidations.

See here:
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/18/bu ... l?referer=

As Brian Essi Has pointed out, the Clinic's behavior is motivated by its desire to increase market share and control the market. They want out of Lakewood but they want our paying patients.

I finished reading this last night---Kucinich's filing in spectacular!

The FTC, FBI, Attorney General, State Auditor, Ethic Commission, Judge O'Donnell and host of others are now all reviewing Summers' and his cronies' conduct at Lakewood Hospital.

While Summers takes the Fifth on advice from counsel and PR spin doctors, his boy wonder mouthpiece Bulllock could not resist the opportunity to make a comment to the press even though he hadn't even read the Kucinich filing. Brilliant!

Butler is right for a change--this is Political Theater and while Summers is cowering offstage, Bullock masquerades as a "leader" and auditions for his next job outside of Lakewood.

Poetry!

Story has hit national health care media:

http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/le ... -open.html

This action by Mr. Kucinich might ultimately prove to be a legacy event that affects our great cgrand hildren and their healthcare in Lakewood.