While I hope a new hospital is built, I’m really not sure now that it ever will be.

Originally the plan announced by Brooks-TLC was to break ground in 2017 with the hospital up and running by late 2019 or early 2020. Even when the new hospitals site was changed, we were assured that the announced timetable would not be impacted.

It is now February 2020 and the website carries this sentence: “We hope to see groundbreaking on our state-of-the-art 29 bed acute care hospital in the village of Fredonia in 2020.” That phrase “We hope to see groundbreaking” is what makes me wonder if the hospital will be built.

At a recent meeting with “selected” area leaders Brooks-TLC officials, contrary to what they previously stated, said that the approval process had to be started all over again when the new location was selected. That is probably a reasonable expectation, but why were we told something different at first?

The Brooks-TLC board, although more than likely overseen by Kaleida in the person of Kaleida employee Mary LaRowe, Brooks president and CEO, has been acting strangely recently. To begin, there was the precipitous and unexpected announcement in December of the closing of Lakeshore Hospital.

Then when the New York state Office of Mental Health categorically prohibited Brooks-TLC from closing the emergency room and mental health unit until they completed that agencies Prior Approval Review Application it was announced that the Lakeshore emergency room was closing when printed notices were distributed to attendees at a rally to save the facility.

What was the motive of the board and Kaleida in acting in this curious manner? It seems that there is more going on here than meets the eye. A major health-care network with 13,000 employees and revenues of $2 billion per year didn’t get there by doing stupid things. At least that is what I would like to think.

The Silver Creek Village Board at a recent meeting lamented the closing of Lakeshore Hospital. Unfortunately, barring a miracle the building will never house a full-service hospital again. The most we can probably hope for might be an urgent care facility or perhaps a branch of the Brooks Hospital lab for blood work and similar testing. Lakeshore Hospital is just another victim of the continuing deterioration of rural health care.

However now the focus of all local governments, be they city, village, town, or county should be on helping to expedite the construction of the new urgent care hospital in Fredonia while demanding that Brooks-TLC and Kaleida be more open to the community about their plans. With an aging population, we need assurance of a hospital closer than Westfield or South Buffalo Mercy.

Recently the OBSERVER carried a story about the meeting Fredonia Mayor Doug Essek and Pomfret Supervisor Dan Pacos had with Brooks-TLC officials which Essek described as a briefing for new officials on the progress of the hospital. This frankly begs the question; Why weren’t all area leaders invited? It must be that Brooks-TLC figured no other local leaders needed to be briefed or that only officials from the municipalities directly impacted were in a position of needing to know. To me, it’s another example of their abysmal community relations skills.

In the OBSERVER, Pacos said that if Brooks-TLC officials are not forthcoming with information it was because they are not able to share some of that information. I am hard pressed to understand what about a public hospital is so “top secret” that they can’t tell their customers? It’s not a question of competitors or anything like that so perhaps they just figure that us common people would not be able to understand the information.

Finally, as I previously stated, it’s readily apparent that Kaleida is more involved in issues involving the new hospital than we might have thought. Based on that supposition, and deciding to take a slightly different tack, I recently sent a letter to Mr. Jody Lomeo, the outgoing CEO at Kaleida to see if perhaps he would be more forthcoming regarding the new hospital. I hope to hear from him but the cynic in me is not holding my breath while awaiting a reply.

Thomas Kirkpatrick Sr. is a Silver Creek resident. Send comments to editorial@observertoday.com