Brooklyn representatives urge reprieve for closing Interfaith Medical Center
Bed-Stuy to be without a hospital; 1,540 employees facing layoffs
Interfaith Medical Center, the only major medical center serving Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights neighborhoods, announced on Tuesday it was beginning the process of shutting down.
Interfaith asked a bankruptcy court to approve its closing, and sent layoff warning notices to more than 1,540 employees, according to AP. A hearing on the closing is scheduled for Aug. 15, and final shutdown is expected by mid-fall.
While Interfaith has been struggling financially for years, Nathan Barotz, chairman of Interfaith’s board of trustees, has said that a 2010 cut in Medicaid reimbursement rates cost Interfaith 40 percent of its inpatient revenue.
In 2011, a state panel known as the Berger Commission recommended merging three struggling Brooklyn hospitals – Wyckoff Heights Medical Center in Bushwick, Brooklyn Hospital Center in Fort Greene, and Interfaith. Wyckoff, however, rejected the merger.