New York State lawmakers have approved legislation designed to overhaul the board that controls Nassau University Medical Center (NUMC) over the objections of the current leadership running the county’s lone public safety-net hospital.
The overhaul will reduce the Nassau County Health Care Corporation board of directors — the panel that oversees NUMC — from 14 members to 11 with Democrats in Albany appointing six that will make up the majority. Republican Nassau lawmakers who currently control the board have signaled their intent to sue to block the change from taking effect on June 1.
“Our hospital is not broken,” said Megan Ryan, who serves as president, chief operating officer and chief legal officer of the public benefit corporation that operates the hospital, A Holly Patterson Skilled Nursing Facility, and its network of clinics.
State lawmakers said the change was needed to correct financial issues at the hospital. The state also approved $50 million in capital funding to enhance, modernize, and financially stabilize NUMC.
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“What we are seeing now is a long-overdue intervention to protect patients and save the institution,” said Gordon Tepper, who is Gov. Kathy Hochul’s press secretary for the Long Island region.
Besides the six members of the board being chosen by the governor — with a pair of recommendations from from Democratic-majority state Senate and Assembly leaders — the minority board members would be selected by Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, a Republican, the GOP-majority county legislature, and one would be appointed by the Democratic minority in the county legislature.
Hochul’s office would name the board chair, a position that the county health commissioner holds.
“The notion that a state-appointed board would have a higher rate of success in managing this critical care facility from Albany is a logical fallacy,” said NHCC Chair Dr. Irina Gelman.
The county executive would also no longer approve the CEO of NUMC. Blakeman’s office did not respond to requests for comment.
The Nassau Interim Finance Authority — a state-appointed control board that has overseen the county’s finances for decades due to Nassau’s long history of budgetary mismanagement — will also be required to approve all NHCC contracts over $1 million, among additional oversight. The hospital board was given a deadline of Dec. 1 to submit a study to NIFA examining how to strengthen NUMC.
NIFA Chairman Richard Kessel said, “We’re prepared to work very closely with the new board to help them do their job to right that institution.”
