Opinion: Threats to St. John’s Episcopal are deja vu for Rockaway residents

Staff at St. John’s Episcopal Hospital. Photo courtesy of SJEH/Facebook

By Howard J. Schwach

I had to laugh when I saw the remarks from local politicians and activists in response to the plan to eviscerate St. John’s Episcopal Hospital in Far Rockaway. 

 “We will not allow this to happen, no way” a politician says. “This will kill many Rockaway residents,” says a local community official. “Hundreds will lose their jobs and their livelihoods,” screams a union official.

I had to laugh because for me, this is déjà vu all over again.

In 2005 the talk came from the state’s Health Department and their pet Berger Commission that there was a movement to reduce the number of beds at both Peninsula Hospital Center and St. John’s Episcopal Hospital as a vast cost savings plan. By the way, Long Beach Hospital was on the list as well, and you know what happened to them.

The recommendation was to close both PHC and St. John’s and build a new, state-of-the-art facility with 400 beds somewhere in the middle of the peninsula.

The report also noted that it would cost $1 million a bed to site and construct the new facility — about half a billion dollars. They flew that up the flagpole, but nobody saluted. In addition, it noted that neither of the two hospital boards wanted to merge with the other. Their positions on the board were too lucrative to lose, but that’s another story for an earlier generation. 

 Failing that, the report called for the reduction of nearly 200 beds from the two hospitals. 

 “Neither of the two hospitals runs at full capacity,” the commission noted, “yet neither can fully absorb the other’s patient load.”

 In a 2005 editorial for The Wave, where I was the managing editor at the time, I argued that the bottom line should not be the defining point and that lives were at stake. Boy, was I naive. 

For several months, I covered political news conferences, demonstrations, debates and community meetings. 

The rallying cry was always “You can’t do this to us.”

They were wrong. They could do it and they did.

Anybody who was here for the battle knows that the outcome was the complete closure of Peninsula Hospital, reportedly because of a faulty laboratory and poor financial control. It was clear that the Berger Commission report was going to be honored and the hospital was going to be closed no matter what. The bottom line was really the determinant. 

Now, the same people are pushing a plan to eviscerate St. John’s. To make it a “micro hospital” or whatever they want to call it now. 

Politicians can threaten, community leaders can rail and rave. Unions can complain. The community can protest.

It will do no good. The die is cast and it comes up snake-eyes for Rockaway. Once again, it’s the bottom line, stupid. 

Howard J. Schwach is the former managing editor of The Wave.