State Approves $300,000 Loan for L.A. Hospice

A $300,000 state-backed loan to help establish a Los Angeles AIDS hospice where terminally ill patients can go to die in peace was unanimously approved Thursday by the California Health Facilities Financing Authority.

In contrast with recent controversy over another AIDS hospice near residences in Los Angeles, the state-supported facility on the grounds of the old Barlow Hospital in Elysian Park has drawn no known opposition.

Officials said it was the first time the state has helped to finance such a facility. Los Angeles County and city funds also are being spent on the project.

Founded 86 years Ago

The Barlow grounds were once the site of a tuberculosis sanitarium founded in 1902 by a doctor who had the disease and was pledged to providing compassionate care for ostracized tuberculosis patients.

Michael Weinstein, president of the Los Angeles AIDS Hospice Foundation, said the 25-bed facility will be dedicated Saturday and is scheduled to open in November. Construction has been under way since April.

Weinstein said the $300,000 state-backed loan will help offset the estimated $800,000 construction cost of the new 24-hour, professionally staffed hospice. Private donations as well as patient reimbursements will provide most of the rest, he added.

“We’re moving hospice care for AIDS patients into the mainstream, creating it as the primary means to deal with AIDS rather than acute (long-term hospital) care,” Weinstein said.

Besides providing dying patients with a less institutional, more informal setting, hospice care also is preferred by some patients because it can cost a fraction of regular hospitalization.

A $10,000 grant for a hospice study also was approved without debate by the state authority. The funds will determine whether a state bond measure should be placed before voters to establish hospices elsewhere in the state.

Agency Borrows Funds

The agency sells tax-exempt revenue bonds to provide low-interest loans to hospitals for expansion purposes. The bonds are repaid by hospital revenues. No state tax dollars are involved, unless a hospital cannot repay the loan.

Los Angeles County previously committed $400,000 to the AIDS hospice and earlier this week approved a contract with hospice coordinators, Weinstein said. He said the city of Los Angeles is expected to contribute another $200,000. He said private donations now total $350,000. These funds are for operating costs and are separate from the $880,000 cost of building the hospice.

The $300,000 loan was approved without debate. The only testifying witness was Chris Flammer, an aide to Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles), whose district includes the hospice site. Polanco also has sponsored a bill, now on the governor’s desk, to establish a separate licensing authority for hospices.

After the vote, Polanco said the loan “will assist in an area that really has been neglected in the past--the delivery of hospice health care to AIDS patients in the Los Angeles region.”

Polanco authored a bill providing for AIDS hospice financing statewide, but the measure died on the last night of the recent legislative session. Polanco said he would reintroduce the measure next year.

Hollywood-Area Hospice

Unlike the recent flap over a Hollywood-area hospice that was allowed to continue operations despite protests from nearby residents, the Barlow Hospital facility has attracted no noticeable opposition.

Last month, several dozen residents near the Hollywood hospice asked the Board of Zoning Appeals to close the Hughes House on Ogden Drive, but the board refused. The facility had opened in a three-bedroom wood-frame house last January and residents felt it did not fit into their single-family neighborhood.

Weinstein said the Barlow Hospital facility is in a largely undeveloped area near Elysian Park and Dodger Stadium and hospice advocates had worked closely with those interests to ensure that all concerns were addressed.