Long Beach facility drops bid to reopen King-Harbor hospital

Los Angeles County officials have lost their only viable candidate to reopen Martin Luther King-Harbor hospital today, leaving it unclear when the burgeoning healthcare crisis in South Los Angeles will be remedied.

Pacific Hospital of Long Beach was identified in recent weeks as the only entity in talks with the county to reopen the shuttered hospital. But Pacific pulled out of negotiations this morning after citing concerns that the county declined to fully disclose.

“I’m eager to find out if there is anything that can be done to bring them back to the table,” said Supervisor Yvonne B. Burke, who represents the district that includes King hospital in Willowbrook. “At this point, I have no reason to think that there is anything that can be done.”

Burke confirmed that “as of Friday when I checked, they were the only live option to reopen the hospital.”

Some health experts criticized the 184-bed Pacific Hospital as simply too small and untested to run such an institution as large and complicated as a public hospital, and the attempt was likely to fail, they said.

The county ended inpatient services at King-Harbor in August after years of failed attempts by the Board of Supervisors to reform the historic institution, treasured by African Americans as a symbol of renewal after the 1965 Watts riots.

The closure occurred under pressure from state and federal regulators whose latest sanctions followed the death of a 43-year-old woman who writhed unattended on the floor of the emergency room lobby for 45 minutes.

The hospital had been buffeted by problems almost since it opened in 1972.

garrett.therolf@latimes.com