Professional Documents
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We are writing to express our serious concerns with the rapidly moving
process for government approval regarding the purchase of the non-profit
Caritas Christi Health Care System (Caritas) by Steward Healthcare System
LLC (Steward), a subsidiary of the Wall Street private equity firm Cerberus
Capital Management (Cerberus). While we understand the desire of the
proponents to move this sale forward quickly, we urge the Department of
Public Health to conduct this review in a deliberate, transparent, and
inclusive manner.
We urge the Public Health Council to hold their vote on Steward’s application
for six Determination of Need (DON) licenses until after interested
stakeholders have the time and opportunity to discuss and negotiate
conditions in the proposed deal with the proponents and/or government
officials.
Our understanding from our involvement with similar sales in the past and
from conversations with staff from the Determination of Need Program is
that individual communities are expected to broker agreements with Caritas
and Cerberus/Steward to create a list of enforceable conditions that will
attach to any DON licenses granted to Steward. Caritas has been preparing
for the deal for years-and Cerberus for numerous months-while communities
were only recently brought into the process. If the responsibility for
brokering a deal is to fall to individual communities throughout the state,
more time is needed to craft DON licensing conditions that will protect public
health, consumers, and satisfy the array of stakeholders.
The proposed sale would remove the Caritas hospitals from public
ownership, potentially impacting access to essential health services for our
state’s poorest residents while having far reaching implications for the future
of Massachusetts’ healthcare system. Patients, community organizations,
and Massachusetts’ taxpayers have the right not just to be heard quickly, but
to have the time and materials to fully engage in the public comment
process.
We look forward to speaking with you. Please contact Matt Wilson at Health
Care For All at 617-275-2940 or mwilson@hcfama.org.
Sincerely,
Lucinda Williams
Dorchester House Governing Board