The Last Gadfly

[Mark Kindt]

Three Questions:

What did the Lakewood Historical Society do officially to save one of our invaluable community and civic institutions -- Lakewood Hospital?

Are Lakewood Historical Society volunteers currently removing antique fixtures from Lakewood Hospital (with city permission)?

Are these antiques fixtures going to auctioned-off or otherwise used by businesses?

AND, a bonus question:

Does the looting of civic wealth in this city never end?

[Jim O'Bryan]

Three Questions:

What did the Lakewood Historical Society do officially to save one of our invaluable community and civic institutions -- Lakewood Hospital?

Are Lakewood Historical Society volunteers currently removing antique fixtures from Lakewood Hospital (with city permission)?

Are these antiques fixtures going to auctioned-off or otherwise used by businesses?

AND, a bonus question:

Does the looting of civic wealth in this city never end?

Mark

Answers I know.

"Are Lakewood Historical Society volunteers currently removing antique fixtures from Lakewood Hospital (with city permission)?"
Ye, they are. There were many items in the hospital that were deemed valuable, and or saveable, and they have been working with the city to acquire them. They will be saved at the Historical Society, and/or sold at one of their many sales. They have done this many times in homes, and buildings torn down. The city is also keeping some items themselves for future use. I also know of at least 3 salvage companies that are going in to salvage items.

.

[Dan Alaimo]

This popped on another social media platform. It applies to local representatives as well.

[Stan Austin]

So, is the Historical Society complicit or rescuers?

[Mark Kindt]

I will leave it at this:

"We lost the hospital, but at least we saved the glass door knobs."

The trustees of Lakewood Hospital Association dump the hospital and the board members of the Lakewood Hospital Society save the door knobs. It's simply ludicrous.

This would be comic and ironic but for the fact that:

145,000 local residents in and around Lakewood no longer have access to the $70,000,000 in local charity care provided by that hospital.

Those are expensive and painful glass door knobs. I won't be in the market for one.

[Jim O'Bryan]

I will leave it at this:

"We lost the hospital, but at least we saved the glass door knobs."

The trustees of Lakewood Hospital Association dump the hospital and the board members of the Lakewood Hospital Society save the door knobs. It's simply ludicrous.

This would be comic and ironic but for the fact that:

145,000 local residents in and around Lakewood no longer have access to the $70,000,000 in local charity care provided by that hospital.

Those are expensive and painful glass door knobs. I won't be in the market for one.

Mark

If I may be so bold as to make a couple corrections, while asking a question and making an observation.

First, they were white porcelain door knobs, last I checked worth about $135 a pair.

Second they also took, the hardwood doors, other fixtures, leaded glass, cabinets, and rare pink marble from the old entry way. I do not have the entire list, but the city kept track, and approved all of it. I am sure the same policy is in place for the others salvaging the building.

My question... Would it be better or worse to not salvage these items and reuse them, sell them for some gain keeping a charity going, use them elsewhere in Lakewood, offer them for public sale, and or keep some of the history in Lakewood, or not?

According to those in charge, The residents voted on tearing down the publicly owned $200,000,000 publicly owned asset, with another hundred million sitting in a private fund to keep it in good condition. That also would have generated another $200,000,000 before the end of the current contract, and was Lakewood's largest employer providing 16,000 high paying jobs. The residents voted on selling it off for $1, and trusting our health to a Family Health Care Center, that is merely a portal to other hospitals outside the area. The residents voted for liquidating these $400 million in assets so that a former Mayor could be a multi-use strip mall bearing the name he sold to the city at the beginning of his term as Mayor more than 10 years ago. The residents voted on liquidating a $400 million dollars asset to get virtually nothing in return but the need to financially support anything that goes in its place for years and years and years. Of course not, the residents were lied to about every part of it, but they voted.

But where the irony truly is the names on the boards of LHA, LHF, Three Arches, Downtown Lakewood, Build Lakewood, and of course the Historical Society.

For these were the architects of the $400 million dollar lose to Lakewood and the nightmare that flows out of the black hole they created.

Irony, no irony is a naked cowboy standing next to a fully dressed hipster.

There is another name for what happened here.

.

[Mark Kindt]

In The History of Lakewood

What we all have witnessed in Lakewood is something that I would never have believed possible. Civic leaders who intentionally "cannibalized" longstanding, functioning and invaluable emergency-preparedness infrastructure owned by the community to monetize various non-profits with insider "sweet-heart" deals. Not to mention the gifting of the hospital acreage to the selected developer.

The non-profits involved all received financial windfalls or other benefits. Enough money and assets have and will be distributed sufficient to construct three or four new hospitals.

The "looting" of these public assets has been nothing if not comprehensive -- right down to the doorknobs now.

[Mark Kindt]

I will leave it at this:

"We lost the hospital, but at least we saved the glass door knobs."

The trustees of Lakewood Hospital Association dump the hospital and the board members of the Lakewood Hospital Society save the door knobs. It's simply ludicrous.

This would be comic and ironic but for the fact that:

145,000 local residents in and around Lakewood no longer have access to the $70,000,000 in local charity care provided by that hospital.

Those are expensive and painful glass door knobs. I won't be in the market for one.

Mark

If I may be so bold as to make a couple corrections, while asking a question and making an observation.

First, they were white porcelain door knobs, last I checked worth about $135 a pair.

Second they also took, the hardwood doors, other fixtures, leaded glass, cabinets, and rare pink marble from the old entry way. I do not have the entire list, but the city kept track, and approved all of it. I am sure the same policy is in place for the others salvaging the building.

My question... Would it be better or worse to not salvage these items and reuse them, sell them for some gain keeping a charity going, use them elsewhere in Lakewood, offer them for public sale, and or keep some of the history in Lakewood, or not?

According to those in charge, The residents voted on tearing down the publicly owned $200,000,000 publicly owned asset, with another hundred million sitting in a private fund to keep it in good condition. That also would have generated another $200,000,000 before the end of the current contract, and was Lakewood's largest employer providing 16,000 high paying jobs. The residents voted on selling it off for $1, and trusting our health to a Family Health Care Center, that is merely a portal to other hospitals outside the area. The residents voted for liquidating these $400 million in assets so that a former Mayor could be a multi-use strip mall bearing the name he sold to the city at the beginning of his term as Mayor more than 10 years ago. The residents voted on liquidating a $400 million dollars asset to get virtually nothing in return but the need to financially support anything that goes in its place for years and years and years. Of course not, the residents were lied to about every part of it, but they voted.

But where the irony truly is the names on the boards of LHA, LHF, Three Arches, Downtown Lakewood, Build Lakewood, and of course the Historical Society.

For these were the architects of the $400 million dollar lose to Lakewood and the nightmare that flows out of the black hole they created.

Irony, no irony is a naked cowboy standing next to a fully dressed hipster.

There is another name for what happened here.

.

Mr. O'Bryan, in my opinion it is of the highest hypocrisy for the organizations you name, who were instrumental in the shuttering and liquidation of Lakewood Hospital on a conflict-ridden basis, to now embark upon a miscellaneous salvage operation and argue to the community that they are doing something "historical" or "beneficial".

The real history of the loss of Lakewood Hospital is not in the doorknobs, but in the documents that the City of Lakewood is still seeking to protect from disclosure and the documents of LHA, LHF, and Three Arches that the public will never see.

Let me be blunt. Public assets, public funds, and public benefits associated with Lakewood Hospital have, at considerable taxpayer and community loss, been liquidated through a kind of well-lawyered "looting" that was clearly tainted by conflict-of-interest and was probably in violation of Ohio public bidding law or disregard of norms of practice.

The "looting" of the doorknobs is just another bizarre chapter in this debacle.

[Jim O'Bryan]

Mr. O'Bryan, in my opinion it is of the highest hypocrisy for the organizations you name, who were instrumental in the shuttering and liquidation of Lakewood Hospital on a conflict-ridden basis, to now embark upon a miscellaneous salvage operation and argue to the community that they are doing something "historical" or "beneficial".

The real history of the loss of Lakewood Hospital is not in the doorknobs, but in the documents that the City of Lakewood is still seeking to protect from disclosure and the documents of LHA, LHF, and Three Arches that the public will never see.

Let me be blunt. Public assets, public funds, and public benefits associated with Lakewood Hospital have, at considerable taxpayer and community loss, been liquidated through a kind of well-lawyered "looting" that was clearly tainted by conflict-of-interest and was probably in violation of Ohio public bidding law or disregard of norms of practice.

The "looting" of the doorknobs is just another bizarre chapter in this debacle.

Mark


No one understands exactly what you are getting at better than I. A small group of people desperately trying to control and run everything. While desperately making it look like they have nothing to do with anything. So many faux meetings for community input, when outcomes were decided in secret in a back room years earlier. Build Lakewood a perfect point in this. Let's ask the community , what they think we should do with this land... that was recently vacated by the Clinic...

It is a farce and a waste of people's time. They do it so when it fails or comes up short, as it almost always does, they can look bewildered and blame the residents.

At the same time there is some push back happening. If the powers to be had their way, the Healthy Lakewood Group would spend their money by giving it to Three Arches, in a move that can only be equated by Hamburgler character at the Golden Arches. indeed that is what they hoped, but some thinking, critical thought people got in their way and slowed it down. NOW that foundation might have a chance to do something with the pennies we got out of the Hospital debacle.

Which brings us back to where we were. The money to fix Lakewood Hospital has been spirited away by the architects of closing the hospital. The one more arch then the Golden Arch people. So we now have an empty building, that i sure to come down, and the residents of Lakewood will be paying that bill in full. So do we move the porcelain door knobs, and oak doors to the landfill out of spite, or?

I will admit the looting of the hospital is just another bizarre, but you might as well get ready for it to get weirder.

SOON you will have a chance to buy a brick, from the building you used to own, that was worth $200 million, was given away for $1, and we PAID to tear it down so you could buy that brick. BET ON IT! After all who would not want a memento of getting royally screwed and lied to by our City Administration and Civic Leaders?

.

[dl meckes]

I'm sure that when Mayor Summers decides to retire and appoint Sam O'Leary to take over his role, there will be many opportunities to pay for salvaged goods.

[Bill Call]

The Master Agreement had this to say about assets:

( 4) All plaques, donor walls and works of art located within Lakewood
Hospital that are not owned by the Clinic and described on Exhibit E, which items will be
transferred to the Lakewood Hospital Foundation for appropriate care and disposition
(collectively the "Excluded Personal Property"). A representative of Lakewood Hospital
Foundation is confirming the inventory set forth on Exhibit E, and the parties agree the same
shall be supplemented as necessary

There was no mention of the $85 million in cash and investments. At least not in the portion of the agreement made public. I suspect that there is a separate secret agreement that spells out the deal in more detail.

[Mark Kindt]

Money, Justice, Compassion

Lest the readers of the Observation Deck view me as a curmudgeonly fount of negativity, I offer some comments on justice and compassion.

Our community is headed down the wrong path and, in their heart-of-hearts, most of the civic leadership understand this.

We are in the process of demolishing an invaluable community and heritage asset founded by our elders and maintained over the years by Lakewood's sons and daughters as not only a viable, but award-winning, acute care hospital. We know instinctively that this was a key element in our emergency-preparedness infrastructure; now gone.

We are in the process of demolishing this community and heritage asset to construct townhouses for upper income future residents, as well as luxury apartments, and Class-A office/retail space.

This is being done at great loss and tremendous cost; all unnecessary.

There were other obvious options:

1. The city administration could have used its powerhouse law firm --Thompson Hine -- to require LHA to meet its long-term contractual obligations and maintain the hospital to the end of the lease in 2026.

2. The city administration could have replaced the LHA incumbent provider with Metro Health System by merely negotiating with them for a new long-term contract (and accept Metro's $100M investment).

Now we witness our community and heritage asset being looted right down to the doorknobs.

With a deep sense of reverence and compassion, I speak . . .

For each local veteran of all foreign wars from World War II to the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan who served our community and now have no local hospital care.

For each of the retired, elderly, and infirm who now have no local hospital care.

For each working class family who now have no local hospital care.

For each person of limited means who now have no local hospital care and no local hospital charity care.

These are my concerns.

[Mark Kindt]

Money, Justice, Compassion

"Our community is headed down the wrong path and, in their heart-of-hearts, most of the civic leadership understand this."

Our civic leadership not only understands this in their heart-of-hearts, they also know it from a 2018 city-commissioned healthcare study prepared by a team of healthcare data analytics firms who looked at everything they could get their hands on.

That study identified numerous and significant healthcare deficiencies in our community that need to be addressed.

I have not seen a copy of this study.

Now with the closure of Lakewood Hospital and the loss of the healthcare services that it provided as well as the approximately $7,000,000 in charity care that it also provided annually, there is simply no way that our community can successfully or even adequately address these healthcare deficiencies.

While the civic leadership delivers on it promise of upscale town homes for the future upper income residents, that promise rests on the backs of actual community residents who have lost both care and coverage.

This is my concern.

[Mark Kindt]

Money, Justice, Compassion

"Our community is headed down the wrong path and, in their heart-of-hearts, most of the civic leadership understand this."

Our civic leadership not only understands this in their heart-of-hearts, they also know it from a 2018 city-commissioned healthcare study prepared by a team of healthcare data analytics firms who looked at everything they could get their hands on.

That study identified numerous and significant healthcare deficiencies in our community that need to be addressed.

I have not seen a copy of this study.

Now with the closure of Lakewood Hospital and the loss of the healthcare services that it provided as well as the approximately $7,000,000 in charity care that it also provided annually, there is simply no way that our community can successfully or even adequately address these healthcare deficiencies.

While the civic leadership delivers on it promise of upscale town homes for the future upper income residents, that promise rests on the backs of actual community residents who have lost both care and coverage.

This is my concern.

At page 18 of this week's Crain's Cleveland Business you will find a list of the largest grant-making foundations. Thirty foundations are on the list. The Three Arches Foundation (f/k/a Lakewood Hospital Foundation) was too small to make this list.

The three smallest foundations on the list (Numbers 28, 29, 30) provided an average of $2,500,000 in grants during 2017. From this we can reasonably infer that the Three Arches Foundation will have less grant-making revenue than even this average amount.

Because the Three Arches Foundation has broadened its scope in terms of geographic service area, the Lakewood community may enjoy even less grant-making support.

The City-commissioned healthcare study identified a laundry-list of under-served populations and healhcare needs for Lakewood.

The solution for the city administration was to tear-down its award-winning hospital and on a "build it, they will come" basis donate the hospital land for the construction of upscale townhouses and upscale retail.

This is my concern.

[Mark Kindt]

The History of Lakewood

The history of Lakewood is not written in salvaged doorknobs from a hospital that, to steal a term from Bill O'Reilly, was "killed" by the civic leadership.

We each know that Lakewood is in a pivotal point in its history. That history is written in the civic documents; most of which are unavailable to the public.

1. The city law department has fought to keep hospital-related documents confidential; many key documents are "blacked-out"; and this is still before the appeals court.

2. The Lakewood Hospital Foundation (n/k/a Three Arches Foundation) documents are not available to the public at all.

The Lakewood Hospital Foundation documents would show the state of knowledge and decision-making process by which that Foundation decided that it would no longer support Lakewood Hospital. Those documents might establish whether or not the Foundation continued to fund-raise for hospital support while knowing that plans existed in 2012 for its demolition. Those documents would explain how the Foundation successfully steered its investment pool away from its public charitable purpose to support Lakewood Hospital.

If the board members of the Lakewood Historical Society were really interested in the history of Lakewood, then they well might want to ask the board members of the Three Arches Foundation for these historical documents before they are lost to time and neglect.

No, better to just keep quiet, and pry the wood paneling off the walls.