By Stephen Witt (Special From Our Time Press)
Fort Greene Assemblyman Walter Mosley this week dismissed a struggling tabloid’s rehashed news concerning Interfaith Medical Center as nothing new while vowing to take a more proactive approach to overseeing the facility that is essential to healthcare in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights.
“The story that came out was inaccurate and had outdated information putting Interfaith in a bad light just as it is building back the confidence from the community,” said Mosley.
Mosley’s comments came following a Daily News story that played up excessive fees that accountants, lawyers and advisors charged in Interfaith’s 2012 federal bankruptcy filing, including federal monitors red-flagging $700,000 in charges for transportation from New Jersey to Brooklyn. It also rehashed old issues concerning emergency wait times and loose security prior to the facility’s restructuring last year.
The tabloid never did a similar story on the beleaguered Long Island College Hospital, when that institution, located in a more affluent neighborhood, was in a crisis that eventually saw it sold and broken apart for lucrative real estate purposes.
Conversely, the 287-bed Interfaith at 1545 Atlantic Avenue, serves a large catchment area of low-income residents in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Crown Heights and throughout central Brooklyn. Its clinics include a mental health clinic, an HIV treatment center on Bergen Street, the Bishop O.G. Walker Jr. Health Care Center, a dental clinic and an urgent care center.
Local elected officials and residents lobbied long and hard last year to keep the facility open. They eventually helped put together a viable restructuring plan that led to the Cuomo Administration utilizing part of an $8 billion federal allocation to keep the facility running.
Mosley said nonetheless of the rehashed reporting, he met with fellow lawmakers including Public Advocate Letitia James, Assembly member Annette Robinson, Sen. Velmanette Montgomery and City Councilmember Robert Cornegy to clarify some issues and strengthen their resolve regrading keeping Interfaith strong and open.
“We wanted to make sure we heard all sides of the story and going forward to have more transparency between the community and what is going on at the hospital,” he said.
Immediately following the story, Cornegy called a quick press conference in which he held the newspaper up and called for Brooklyn District Attorney Ken Thompson to convene a grand jury to investigate the alleged inflated charges stemming from the bankruptcy proceedings.
Several political pundits questioned Cornegy’s move as the bankruptcy proceeding was done in the federal court system. Therefore Thompson convening a state grand jury to investigate a federal ruling would be at best unusual and at worst out of Thompson’s jurisdiction.
But in response to Cornegy’s call to action, Thompson did say he intends to investigate the matter.
“Interfaith has been providing lifesaving healthcare to the residents of central Brooklyn for generations. To now learn about questionable billing practices, and reported excessive fees and expenses after the community fought so hard to save the hospital is troubling,” he said.
When questioned by Our Time Press on why he would ask the Brooklyn DA to convene a grand jury over a federal court proceeding, Cornegy said his goal is to protect Interfaith as a healthcare resource for the people of central Brooklyn.
“I was on the front lines of fighting to save Interfaith, even before I took office, alongside community members, hospital employees and other elected officials. I see speaking out against problematic spending there as part of the same fight. The services the hospital provides are simply too critical to tolerate wasteful spending,” he said.
