A group interested in operating Community Medical Center Long Beach submitted the following letter, dated May 7, 2018, to John Keisler, director of the Long Beach Economic Development Department. (Editor’s note: Click here to read the background on this matter, “MemorialCare’s John Bishop Objects To Pressure From City To Run Community Hospital While Potential New Operator Gears Up.”)
“We represent a consortium of health care organizations that have come together in the interest of operating Community Medical Center Long Beach (“Community”). This consortium is made up of:
• John & Mario Molina: the Molina brothers have over 30 years’ experience in working in the Long Beach health care community as leaders of Molina Healthcare and Golden Shore Medical Group.
• AHMC: AHMC has over 30 years’ experience in hospital management. AHMC owns and operates seven community hospitals in Southern California.
• Network Medical Management: NMM has nearly 25 years’ experience in managing physicians and working with managed care organizations to improve patient care. NMM serves thousands of physicians in Long Beach and contracts with Golden Shore Medical Group, as well as Accountable IPA (a large Long Beach-based physician network).
We are pleased to include CSULB’s School of Gerontology and School of Nursing as adjunct members of the consortium.
Our proposal would be to establish an entity that would lease the Community campus from the City and take over the current hospital license. We strongly believe Community provides vital critical acute care and emergency healthcare services and should continue its operations for the safety, health and welfare of its community. We also recognize that Community, in its current construct, cannot continue operations due to seismic requirements; however, we are willing to work with the City to reconfigure those portions of Community which meet seismic standards in order to maintain an acute care hospital and Emergency Department. We propose to continue operating all hospital services necessary in maintaining Emergency Room services, including capability to receive Advanced Life Support (ALS) paramedic ambulances. We also propose to substantially hire Community employees to provide these services.
We believe that the original hospital building meets current seismic standards and can be operated as an acute care hospital that includes an Emergency Department and 30-40 inpatient beds. In order to operate as such, several departments will need to be relocated and other parts of the facility may need upgrading. Furthermore, we intend to work with the City to develop a long-term seismic compliance plan that would allow for the continued use of the remaining parts of the hospital pending seismic retrofit.
In addition, one or more of the following complementary components would be added to transform the facility into a “health care community”:
• Independent and assisted living services
• Inpatient and outpatient behavioral health services
• Program for All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE)
• Medical Education (in conjunction with CSULB)
• Outpatient medical and surgical services
• Additional nonmedical residential (as might be integrated)
It would be our intent that the organization created by the consortium would contract with the City of Long Beach to lease the property and in turn would subcontract out for services as follows:
• AHMC would be contracted to operate the hospital
• NMM would be contracted to bring managed care contracts to the hospital, help physicians manage those contracts and provide other “back office” support to insure long-term financial viability of the hospital
In order to implement this ambitious program, we would request the following from the City:
• 40-year lease for all Community property, facilities, equipment and licenses
• Lease rate of $1 per year
• Consultation/facilitation regarding financing for structural changes required to move certain departments into the original hospital building and upgrading/renovating other parts of the facilities
• Consultation/facilitation of the building process so as to expedite through the planning and building process
We look forward to the next steps in this process. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us.
Sincerely”
(The letter was signed by John Molina, Dr. Sim and Dr. Wu.)