Community Hospital Agreement Reached

The City of Long Beach and healthcare group Molina, Wu, Network, LLC, (MWN) have reached an agreement regarding Community Hospital Long Beach.

“Things are moving right along in a positive direction since our March 12th council vote approving the interim lease agreement with Molina Wu Network,” Fourth District Councilman Daryl Supernaw wrote in an emailed newsletter March 22.

He added city staff is currently working with the Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development (OSHPD).

Supernaw’s office will host a stakeholder update meeting at 6 p.m. Wednesday, April 3 at the Big Rec Golf Course Club House at 5001 Deukmejian Dr.

“We’ve made reopening Community Hospital a priority, and are committed to an accessible and safe emergency room in East Long Beach,” Mayor Robert Garcia said in a statement. “I’m confident that our new partners at MWN will operate a model facility that will provide outstanding medical care and health services.”

If things go as planned, the hilltop facility on Termino Avenue near Pacific Coast Highway will reopen later this year. The hospital – with the only emergency room on the city’s eastside – closed last July 3. Former operator MemorialCare stepped away after learning the facility sat on a fault line which was larger and more active than previously thought. The facility did not meet the state’s new seismic standards.

A MemorialCare spokesperson detailed last spring that “because the fault is large and active, to continue operations as an acute care hospital, large portions of the hospital would have to be demolished, resulting in a small, 94-year-old facility with no more than 20 acute care beds, which operationally is not feasible to run.”

However, MWN spokesman Brandon Dowling updated the situation through email March 21.

“MWN is currently working with the City of Long Beach and State of California to secure the hospital license and to ensure seismic compliance,” he wrote. “Assuming the city and MWN do not discover any unforeseen challenges as we move towards opening the hospital, we expect to be operational before the end of this year.”

As part of the agreement, the operation of Community Hospital will be recognized as a public-private partnership between Long Beach and MWN, according to a city press release.

The agreement will consist of a 45-year lease term, with the option of two 10-year extensions, at a lease rate of $1 a year.

There will be shared funding responsibility of Community Hospital’s seismic retrofit costs between the city and MWN for up to $50 million and MWN will be responsible for any additional seismic-related costs, the press release states.

The city will be responsible for up to $25 million of these costs to ensure the facility complies with seismic laws and regulations for an acute care hospital, the release adds.

The leased premises shall be used for an acute care facility, professional office building, and other ancillary medical uses. The lessee will make a good faith effort to provide sobering center beds, medical detox beds, recuperative care, and psychiatric beds to address community needs identified in the city’s Everyone Home task force report, subject to appropriate licensure and regulatory approvals, the release states.

“It’s been our goal since day one to return this hospital back to the community,” John Molina of MWN said in a statement. “We look forward to our partnership with the city to ensure Community Hospital can continue to provide meaningful, quality care services.”

Dale Whitney, a Long Beach resident and former pastor at Geneva Presbyterian Church of East Long Beach, expressed happiness at Community Hospital reopening.

“Community Hospital is a historic component of the ongoing culture of East Long Beach, up to and including the Emergency Room. I can hardly wait until the hospital is open as a full-service facility once again.”

kirt@beachcomber.news