$32 Million Is OKd for Repairs at King/Drew

Los Angeles County supervisors voted Tuesday to spend $32 million to repair deteriorating facilities at Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center, including the removal of corroded sewer and steam pipes that have leaked water and waste into the hospital.

The injection of cash to improve the hospital’s crumbling infrastructure comes as the county is also considering options to scale down the medical center or to hire a private contractor to provide services.

But county health officials described the money as evidence of their intention to keep open the hospital in Willowbrook, which serves a largely poor, minority community near Watts.

“There’s an obvious commitment to having a hospital that’s modern and functional in this area of the city,” said Dr. Thomas Garthwaite, the county’s director of health services.

The county is spending millions of dollars to fix problems at the troubled hospital, which has been cited by federal inspectors after a series of patient lapses and deaths.

Among the costs is a $15-million contract with a consulting firm to run the facility for a year.

Health officials told the board that the repairs were vital to restoring King/Drew’s national accreditation and retaining federal funding, which accounts for more than half of its budget.

Inspectors with the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations cited the hospital last year for housing surgical equipment in rusty, unclean cabinets and treating psychiatric patients in areas exposed to fixtures that could aid suicide attempts.

Fixing those problems would cost $7 million, according to county health documents.

But the repair plan also calls for replacement of the hospital’s corroded waste lines, air ducts and electrical panels.

“We believe very strongly that they’re a critical piece of the future of the medical center,” said Dr. Hector Flores, chairman of the hospital’s advisory board.

The repairs are the first part of a two-phase refurbishment plan that is estimated to cost $64 million.

County supervisors unanimously approved the first expenditure but not without heated discussion.

Supervisor Gloria Molina questioned whether county health officials had done enough to determine whether poor upkeep or improper waste disposal had contributed to the pipe corrosion. And she expressed skepticism about the repairs’ price tag.

“My concern is that’s an awful lot of money, and I’m sure that it’s only one-third of the costs,” Molina said.

“Every single time we put a fix into this, we think it’s a fix,” she said. “And then if we go down the line, we find out it’s not really a fix.”