Earlier today, State Treasurer John Kennedy and the efficiency and benchmarking subcommittee on the Commission for Streamlining Government unanimously endorsed the RMJM/FHL plan to gut and rebuild Charity Hospital!

It turns out not all of our public leaders are blindly accepting an expensive, wasteful, and destructive medical complex without considering more viable alternatives.

The unanimous resolution is not just a call for more studies or hearings, it is an explicit endorsement of the alternative plan to save Charity Hospital and Lower Mid-City, something no state body has had the fortitude to do before today.

The Louisiana Streamlining Government Commission recommends to the governor and the Louisiana Legislature that the existing but currently unoccupied “Big Charity Hospital” building be rehabilitated and used as a public teaching hospital if the State of Louisiana decides to go forward with its plans to construct such a hospital in New Orleans.

This marks the first time in the history of this controversy that a state body has officially endorsed the RMJM/FHL alternative plan, which proposes gutting Charity Hospital and building a state-of-the-art medical facility within its historic facade. This plan would save at least $280 million compared to the LSU/VA proposal. It would also take years less time to complete and would prevent the unnecessary demolition of the Lower Mid-City community currently marked for expropriation to make way for the sprawling LSU/VA.

The motion will go before the full Louisiana Streamlining Government Commission soon.

We hope the rest of the Commission will be as open-minded as the subcommittee was today.