City Council Acts to Redirect Chevron Funding to Doctors Medical Center

Richmond’s City Council voted Tuesday night to take steps to use settlement money from Chevron to prevent the looming closure of West Contra Costa County’s only public hospital. The council voted unanimously to approve a motion by Mayor Gayle McLaughlin stating its intent to redirect $15 million from a $90 million community investment agreement with Chevron to Doctors Medical Center in San Pablo, which has drastically downsized in recent months amid an ongoing financial crisis. Chevron has promised to distribute the $90 million to the city over 10 years in exchange for the city’s approval of its $1 billion refinery modernization project.

If approved by Chevron, the bulk of the reallocated $15 million would be cut from Richmond Promise, a scholarship program meant to send every graduating public high school student in the city to college. Funding would also be diverted from a job-training program, law enforcement initiatives and a program to provide Internet access in low-income neighborhoods.

City Councilman Corky Booze, who abstained from the final vote, initially introduced a proposal to redirect $20 million destined for green transportation programs and a solar farm project. But city staff said Tuesday night that the city must spend $30 million of the Chevron funding on greenhouse gas emission reductions programs under the company’s Environmental and Community Investment Agreement with the city.

Reallocating the funding to non-green energy programs might be possible, but legally risky, city staffers said. The council also voted to direct City Manager Bill Lindsay to meet with representatives from the county and neighboring cities about contributing funds to keep Doctors Medical Center open.

“We cannot expect to do this alone - we need the cooperation of other cities,” Councilman Nat Bates said, adding that the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors “have got to step up to the plate” with funding solutions for the hospital. The board of supervisors earlier this year voted to transfer $6 million to the financially troubled hospital but has said it can’t afford to provide ongoing funding.

On Tuesday night, the council also directed Lindsay to meet with Chevron to request that the company accelerate the previously agreed-upon multi-million-dollar payments to the city. City council members reasoned that without quicker funding from Chevron there wouldn’t be enough funding to keep DMC open. And under the agreement, the payouts won’t begin until construction on the refinery project starts - a process blocked by court challenges from environmental groups including Communities for a Better Environment and the Asian Pacific Environmental Network, according to Chevron spokeswoman Melissa Ritchie. Many of the council members and residents on Tuesday called for the environmental groups to drop the litigation in order to free up the Chevron funding.

DMC Interim CEO Dawn Gideon said Tuesday that the hospital has just enough money to stay open through February, thanks in part to a one-time $3 million cash infusion from state Senate Bill 883 signed by Gov. Jerry Brown late last month.

“This year, Doctors Medical Center will celebrate its 60th anniversary of service to Richmond and the broader West Contra Costa community, serving more than 80,000 patients annually,” Gideon said. “Without immediate and meaningful financial support to address our structural $18 million annual deficit, this will also be our last year as a full service provider,” she said.

The hospital’s longtime fiscal woes stem from a patient population made up mostly of uninsured and underinsured residents, leaving the hospital with low reimbursement payments. In the months since West Contra Costa Healthcare District voters rejected a parcel tax measure meant to bridge DMC’s deficit, the hospital has shed more than 200 staff members and seen its number of inpatient beds drop below 50.

In August, emergency ambulance service stopped at the hospital, leaving patients to seek comparable care at other Bay Area hospitals. During Tuesday night’s meeting, the council heard from more than three-dozen community members decrying the current state of the hospital and pleading with them to find a solution to keep it running.

“That hospital means so much to me and most of the people I know in this community, and I just hope you guys can get together and make Chevron pay,” Richmond resident Kevin McDonald, 57, told the council. “We all need to get together to save this,” he said.

—By Bay City News

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