St. Vincent’s Hospital

SAVE ST. VINCENT’S HOSPITAL

April 15, 2020

St. Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan filed its long-expected petition for bankruptcy on Wednesday, indicating that its largest unsecured creditor was a federal pension insurance agency.

The petition for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, filed in Federal District Court in Manhattan, showed liabilities of more than $1 billion. It was not clear exactly how much more, since that amount is the highest that a debtor can check off on the form.

In the No. 2 spot for creditors was a medical malpractice trust monitor, owed $113 million.

The hospital said the bankruptcy filing would allow it to continue caring for patients as it closes.

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, an arm of the federal government, has $180 million in claims that the pension fund does not have the money for.

While the $180 million debt is not by itself enough to swamp the federal fund, which is running a deficit, it comes on the heels of a major recession and a string of other pension collapses.

But Michael Fagan, a spokesman for the hospital, said the pensions were “not at risk.” Jeffrey Speicher, a spokesman for the federal fund, agreed, saying, “The bottom line is the nurses are going to get their pension.”

April 2, 2010

By Sharon Otterman

Another potential savior has decided to pass on St. Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan, leaving the struggling Greenwich Village institution without a feasible rescue plan as it tries to stave off closing.

Mount Sinai Medical Center, which had been looking into a partnership with St. Vincent’s, decided on Wednesday that it was not interested.

“We have concluded that we are not going to pursue the acquisition of the inpatient operations of St. Vincent Catholic Medical Centers, but we will continue to consider other health care options for the communities served by St. Vincent’s,” Mount Sinai said in a statement. It did not elaborate.

Over the next several days, the St. Vincent’s board will meet to discuss if any option short of bankruptcy still exists for the nonprofit charity hospital, which has provided health care to its surrounding community for over 160 years.

“As the leadership of Mount Sinai has concluded that it will not pursue the operation of St. Vincent’s as an acute-care hospital, our board will be in discussions with our management, legal and financial advisers to quickly access our strategic options moving forward,” St. Vincent’s said in a press release.

But declaring bankruptcy might not be enough to save the hospital, which emerged from bankruptcy only three years ago. Its creditors could force it to close, with its assets — principally its valuable Village real estate — sold off to satisfy some of its $700 million debt.

The hospital had been set to declare bankruptcy the first week of February, but a total of about $20 million in emergency loans from the state and the hospital’s main creditors, GE Capital and TD Bank, helped give it a few more weeks to make payroll and search for a partner.

The hospital, which is running at a deficit of $7 million to $10 million a month, has spent nearly all that money, and with Albany deep in its own financial trouble, more state money is unlikely, people close to the process said on Thursday.

The office of Gov. David A. Paterson has been leading a task force to search for alternatives, and in recent days it has met almost daily. The governor said in a statement on Thursday that he had personally called potential hospital partners “to indicate our willingness to work with them in assisting the hospital.”

“I am disappointed that at this point, there does not appear to be a partner for the hospital,” the governor said in a statement, adding that the task force “will continue to work with the hospital, unions, elected officials, lenders and others until every viable avenue is exhausted.”

In January, Continuum Health Partners, a consortium in Brooklyn and Manhattan, offered to take over St. Vincent’s outpatient facilities, but it withdrew that offer, in part because of local opposition to Continuum’s plan to shut down most emergency room functions and to send 911 ambulance calls to other hospitals.

Local officials vowed on Thursday that this would not be the end. “This is a setback, but it is not over, and we are continuing to look for partners to keep the hospital open,” said Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker and a member of the hospital task force.

Printer friendly: St. Vincent Struggle

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Struggling Catholic hospital has about two weeks of cash left after Mount Sinai decides the rescue cost was too high.

By Barbara Benson

A bankruptcy may be inevitable for St. Vincent’s Hospital after Mount Sinai Medical Center’s board decided not to pursue a deal with the Greenwich Village institution. St. Vincent’s now has about two weeks of cash left, and neither the state nor its current lenders are keen to loan the hospital additional money.

The scope of the financial commitment necessary to turn St. Vincent’s around proved to be too great for Mount Sinai, according to people familiar with the talks. Running at roughly a $120 million annual deficit, St. Vincent’s has been so strapped for cash that it has been deferring maintenance of the facility, which is in poor physical shape. Mount Sinai also took into account the high cost of restarting the hospital’s closed residency programs, as well as looming cuts in Medicaid and Medicare.

St. Vincent’s chief restructuring officer, Mark Toney, told key players last week that the hospital will need $275 million to $300 million over three years to survive as a stand-alone entity and make needed upgrades, according to one source. At least $175 million of that would be in the first year alone, Mr. Toney said.

It is unlikely that any white knight would be able to shoulder the financial burden and take over St. Vincent’s. But both politicians and the hospital’s chief union, 1199 SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, are working hard to find a savior. The key hurdle now is keeping St. Vincent’s open, whether or not it files for bankruptcy.

In a statement a month ago, Darren Alcus, president of GE Capital Healthcare Financial Services, the hospital’s major lender, said it was “critical that the hospital achieve a successful collaboration in the very near term as it likely will be unfeasible for us to extend additional funds to stem their continued financial losses.”

With the clock ticking, St. Vincent’s board is scheduled to meet next week. “Our board will be in discussions with our management, legal and financial advisers to quickly access our strategic options moving forward,” St. Vincent’s said in a statement.

This week, GE Capital said in a statement: “We are disappointed that Mount Sinai has decided not to proceed. We continue to work with St. Vincent’s, and we are waiting for its board’s decision on how they will proceed at this point.”

Printer friendly: Miracle

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

March 1, 2010

By New York State Office of the Governor

ALBANY, NY (03/01/2010)– Governor David A. Paterson today announced that additional emergency funding has been secured for Saint Vincent Catholic Medical Center (SVCMC), providing the Stakeholder Task Force with more time to develop a viable, long-term strategy for the hospital’s future. The funds were provided by GE Capital and TD Bank, which committed $5 million, and the State Assembly Majority, which committed $1 million.

“I am pleased to announce that we have obtained these funds and thank GE Capital, TD Bank, and the State Assembly Majority. This support will enable our Stakeholder Task Force to continue working on a plan for SVCMC’s future,” Governor Paterson said. “Meeting the health needs of this community remains our priority and we will continue to explore the options available so that SVCMC can continue to serve New Yorkers.”

Governor Paterson convened the SVCMC Stakeholder Task Force last month to review how the hospital could continue its operations and preserve access to its critical medical services. The Task Force is comprised of representatives from SVCMC and its sponsors, lenders, 1199SEIU, the New York State Nurses Association, the Greater New York Hospital Association, and federal, state and local elected officials. The Governor also created smaller working groups to meet daily and to facilitate, organize and streamline the sharing of information.

Mark Toney, Chief Restructuring Officer for SVCMC said: “Over the past four weeks, we have had a number of discussions with potential partners for Saint Vincent’s in order to preserve vital healthcare services for the West Side. The new funds made available today give us additional time to continue discussions. We are grateful to GE Capital, TD Bank and the New York State Assembly for their support of these efforts.”

Darren Alcus, President GE Capital Healthcare Financial Services, said: “We are pleased that the State Assembly has committed to providing $1 million in funding for SVCMC in conjunction with our commitment to provide an additional loan of $5 million today to SVCMC. As Saint Vincent’s and the Task Force are close to completing their work to explore options for the future of the hospital, we are willing to offer this additional $5 million emergency loan, on top of several previous emergency loans over the last few weeks and the more than $300 million in loans we have with Saint Vincent’s. It is critical that the hospital achieves a successful collaboration in the very near term as it likely will be unfeasible for us to extend additional funds to stem their continued financial losses.”

Assemblyman Richard Gottfried, Chair of the Assembly Health Committee, said: “I am delighted that GE Capital and Assembly Speaker Silver have been able to step in to help give us more time to work out a good future for Saint Vincent’s.”

Assemblywoman Deborah Glick said: “We are enormously pleased that we were in a position to provide some essential resources in our continuing effort to save crucial health care on the Lower West Side. Saint Vincent’s is a much needed hospital and this is an important step in preserving quality health care for our community.”

Congressman Jerrold Nadler said: “Members of the Saint Vincent’s task force are working around the clock to save the hospital. We believe it is essential to maintain an acute care facility on the Lower West Side of Manhattan. And to that end I want to thank GE Capital and TD Bank who tonight have extended another life line to Saint Vincent’s by making an additional $5 million available so that the hospital can continue to operate and meet it’s obligations. This along with $1 million in funding by the State Assembly Majority will allow vital health services to continue at Saint Vincent’s.”

Senator Tom Duane said: “I am grateful to GE Capital and TD Bank for again stepping up with a vital cash infusion for SVCMC. I will continue my efforts to secure additional State funds to sustain SVCMC short-term as it continues working towards a viable long-term plan.”

New York City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn said: “I am thankful to all parties who have stepped up to help recognize that Manhattan’s west side needs a Saint Vincent’s emergency room and acute care hospital, in addition to a number of its community programs. Governor Paterson, GE Capital, TD Bank, and 1199 should all be thanked for the enormous amount of time and energy they have committed to this process. I also want to thank GE and TD Bank, and the New York State Assembly for their additional investment in this vital community institution. We will continue to work with all parties in an effort to create a long term solution to this problem.”

Kevin Finnegan, Political Director for 1199SEIU, said: “We are very thankful to GE Capital, TD Bank and the State Assembly for their willingness to come forward with financial support for St. Vincent’s hospital. These loans bring us one step closer to allowing the hospital to continue providing vital healthcare services to the West Village and Lower Manhattan. We will work closely with the hospital and all its stakeholders over the coming weeks to solidify a long term solution to the current crisis.”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Elected officials, nurses and hospital workers rallied in front of cash-strapped St. Vincent’s Hospital Monday.

They are urging state officials to keep the Greenwich Village hospital open.

St. Vincent’s is currently $700 million in debt.

Governor David Paterson had given the hospital a month to develop a viable rescue plan. But the month is almost over and a task force made up of hospital officials, lawmakers and labor leaders has not been able to come up with a solution.

Workers say not only is this a crisis for the actual employees, but it is also a major problem for the community.
Hospital Workers Rally State To Keep St. Vincent’s Open

“The nurses need to rally because we need to be together. This has been a very stressful situation for all of us for the last couple of months,” said St. Vincent’s Nurses Association President Eileen Dunn.

“I’ve been employed here for the last 20 years, so basically I grew up here at St. Vincent’s; it’s a family,” said another hospital worker. “It’s sad what’s going on. But the real issue is the impact it’s going to have on the community.”

Union employees have already agreed to a 10 percent pay cut for the next four months and non-union workers have agreed to slice salaries as much as 25 percent.

“The Health Commissioner Danes could be a little more helpful as well in terms of getting involved and really putting the state back in a place where compassion and health care is of value,” said Lorraine Seidel of the St. Vincent’s Nurses’ Union.

The hospital has already laid off 300 unionized workers.

A previous deal to buy the hospital and phase out its emergency care facilities was abandoned after much criticism.

__________

Click here to read the BALCONY Bulletin (1/28/10)

Hospital Network Withdraws Proposal to Take Over St. Vincent’s

By Anemona Hartocollis

A large hospital network that had offered to take over the nearly bankrupt St. Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan in Greenwich Village has formally withdrawn its offer, further clouding the hospital’s prospects for survival.

Stan Brezenoff, president of Continuum Health Partners, a consortium of five hospitals in Manhattan and Brooklyn, said in a letter to Henry J. Amoroso, the president and chief executive of St. Vincent’s, that he was withdrawing the offer because of what he said had been a negative reaction to it from both the State Health Department and St. Vincent’s own board. The letter was sent last Friday but not released until Thursday. But Mr. Brezenoff left open the possibility that St. Vincent’s could return to talks with Continuum.

The uncertainty over St. Vincent’s future has led some doctors — especially star doctors — to begin making plans beyond their affiliation with St. Vincent’s. Several St. Vincent’s physicians have approached Continuum about securing admitting privileges at its hospitals, which would give them the right to work in those hospitals, Jim Mandler, a spokesman for the network, confirmed Thursday. Mr. Mandler said Continuum was talking to those doctors, “because we are very much aware of the recruitment efforts of other hospitals for these physicians.”

In its offer submitted to St. Vincent’s on Jan. 22, Continuum proposed to continue running outpatient facilities for the hospital, on 12th Street and Seventh Avenue, while funneling those who need inpatient care to its own hospitals, St. Luke’s Roosevelt on West 58th Street and Beth Israel, across town on the East Side. Most emergency room and inpatient services would have been eliminated.

St. Vincent’s, the last remaining Catholic general hospital in New York City, is $700 million in debt and needed a state loan this week to make its payroll.

The Continuum plan created an immediate uproar at St. Vincent’s and among local politicians, who said the neighborhood could not be without an emergency room or inpatient services and who accused Continuum of being more interested in shutting down competition and improving its own finances than in saving neighborhood health care.

In his letter, Mr. Brezenoff expressed pique that St. Vincent’s was considering looking for other offers, hinting that he believed that this would turn Continuum’s offer into a bargaining chip. He made it clear that his offer had been a take-it-or-leave-it one.

“On reflection,” Mr. Brezenoff said, “I feel constrained to take the formal step of withdrawing the proposal that we sent to you on January 22, 2010.”

Mr. Brezenoff declined to comment Thursday, but his swift withdrawal of the offer seven days after submitting it reflected his reputation as a skilled player of political hardball, skills honed as a former president of the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation, executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and a deputy mayor in the administration of Mayor Edward I. Koch.

His letter indicated that the door was still open to negotiation if St. Vincent’s came back to him on his terms. “Needless to say, I hope, we stand ready to resume discussions and negotiations at any time if it appears that this would be productive,” the letter said.

Sister Jane Iannucelli, the vice chairwoman of St. Vincent’s board, declined on Thursday to comment on Mr. Brezenoff’s letter.

Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn put a positive spin on Mr. Brezenoff’s decision, saying it could be good for the hospital, because it indicated “a growing recognition of all the parties involved in this process that the community is not going to accept a proposal that doesn’t sustain a full-service hospital.”

Continuum was absent from a meeting Wednesday with Gov. David A. Paterson, Mr. Amoroso, local elected officials, union leaders and hospital creditors to discuss a long-term solution for the hospital’s financial problems. The governor said after the meeting that the state had agreed to keep St. Vincent’s afloat for at least a month while it looked for partners.

Mr. Brezenoff suggested in his letter that the state had been critical of Continuum’s plan to eliminate the hospital’s inpatient beds and close its emergency room. Diane Mathis, a spokeswoman for the state Health Department, said the department had taken a neutral position on it. “This process has really just begun,” she said.

__________

BALCONY URGES NEW YORK STATE TO SAVE ST. VINCENT’S HOSPITAL

For release Thursday January 28, 2010

“The possible closure of St. Vincent’s Hospital in Greenwich Village will tear a huge hole in New York’s Health Care Safety Net,” charged BALCONY Director Lou Gordon as the Business and Labor Coalition of New York (www.balconynewyork.com ) urged the New York State Department of Health to provide immediate assistance to maintain the hospital.

“It makes no sense to close the emergency room of St. Vincent’s Hospital which is the only hospital serving the West Side of Manhattan below 59^th Street. This community is bursting at the seams as thousands of New Yorkers are relocating to the apartments and condos there. New York is building a new subway line on the West Side, we are creating a condomania on 42^nd Street and Chelsea is experiencing an unprecedented boom. St. Vincent’s Hospital is the most valuable health resource in the community. On September 11, 2001, St. Vincent’s played a key role in providing medical services to those at and near Ground Zero. New York State cannot turn its back on the health care needs of the businesses and union workers who rely upon the Hospital as a primary center of medical and emergency services.”

“If Washington can save Wall Street, Albany can save St. Vincent’s Hospital,” stated Gordon.

“I know how vital the St. Vincent’s Hospital services are to the community I once represented as its State Senator” stated Catherine Abate president and CEO of Community Healthcare Networks.

“I urge the state to do everything possible to save St. Vincent’s.”

“Thousands of New York City school students and teachers rely upon this hospital for care. We urge the State Legislature and Department of Health to keep the hospital open and viable,” stated Alan Lubin co- chair of BALCONY. “Closing St. Vincent’s Hospital is Bad Medicine.”

“We urge members of BALCONY to join City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Assemblyman Dick Gottfried, Assemblywoman Deborah Glick , Senator Tom Duane, Congressman Jerald Nadler and Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer in contacting New York State Department of Health Commissioner Richard Daines telling the state to make every effort to Save St. Vincent’s Hospital,” concluded Bruce Ventimiglia, Co-Chair of BALCONY.

BALCONY members are urged to go to Speaker Quinn’s website and join the campaign to Save St. Vincent’s hospital — http://council.nyc.gov/html/action_center/stvincents.shtml

For more information contact BALCONY Director Lou Gordon (212) 219-7777 loug@balconynewyork.com

__________

1199 SEIU is actually organizing a town hall meeting on Thursday night, January 28, 2010.  Click here for the  flyer.

__________

Speaker Christine Quinn held a news conference outside the hospital on January 26, 2010. She has activated a website on the City Council page that allows individuals to send a message to Commissioner Daines that we need to ensure proper access to health services on the West Side.  Click here for the link to the page: http://council.nyc.gov/html/action_center/stvincents.shtml.

__________

Click here to read the NY Times article:

Offer to Take Over Ailing Hospital Stirs Outcry

__________

Click here to read more about the St. Vincent’s RN protest.

__________

Click here to read the statement by NYS Assembly Health Committee Chair Richard N. Gottfried