Buses to hospital meeting will roll

Belleville News-Democrat

March 15, 2008

By Carolyn P. Smith

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Mayor Alvin Parks on Friday called for the communities of East St. Louis and the surrounding area to sponsor buses to take people to the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board meeting April 8 in Springfield.

The board is scheduled to make a decision that day about whether to allow Southern Illinois Healthcare Foundation to merge its certificate of need at Kenneth Hall Regional Hospital with Touchette Regional Hospital in Centreville.

Parks wants people from Washington Park, Alorton, Fairview Heights, Brooklyn and elsewhere to get on the bus to support keeping Kenneth Hall open.

Parks said he is sending letters to corporations, churches, philanthropists and residents asking them all to make donations. Buses cost $650 each, and the trip is not being funded with East St. Louis tax dollars. The donations also will pay for marketing and other expenses for the effort, Parks said. Parks said the donations need to be made by April 1.

Parks also said anyone who wants to ride the buses needs to be at City Hall by 6 a.m. A caravan of 22 buses full of local residents traveled to Springfield Jan. 15. The board postponed its decision to April 8.

Parks said the people who know East St. Louis needs a hospital must stand up at the Springfield meeting to make sure the board knows how important Kenneth Hall is to East St. Louis. He said foundation officials already have systematically begun closing the hospital. City Manager Robert Betts said a hospital is a vital part of any community.

Foundation spokesman Ronda Sauget said the hospital is losing $3 million a year, and that is why the foundation wants to merge it with Touchette.

Parks said he is still open to working with the foundation if it wants to operate Kenneth Hall as a full hospital. If it wants to leave East St. Louis, he has no problem with that. 'We want them to leave our certificate of need and sell the hospital to somebody else who wants to run it,' Parks said.

Sauget said: 'The certificate of need is like a building permit. It belongs to Kenneth Hall. You can't sell it or transfer it. If the mayor wants to own his own hospital, there is nothing stopping him or anybody else from getting their own today. They can file an application like anybody else. It doesn't belong to a municipality. It belongs to the person the C.O.N. (certificate of need) was issued to operate the hospital.'

Parks said the group Pro Team Management has made an offer to buy Kenneth Hall but has heard nothing from the foundation.

Sauget said no viable entity has been brought to the foundation's attention. 'We don't know who Pro Team is,' she said. 'They have not provided us with any legal or financial documents saying they have $5 billion. We read in another newspaper that Alvin Bush (a member of Pro Team) said that he has access to $5 billion. I would say, 'Where is this money?'

'Mystery buyers today are just as much a mystery as they have always been. Where did the money come from? Why be apprehensive in providing documents if you're a viable entity?'

Sauget said if the merger of the certificate of need is not granted, hospital officials will be forced to close Kenneth Hall.

Contact reporter Carolyn P. Smith at csmith@bnd.com or 239-2503.

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