More News

Two Maryland lawmakers pledged Monday to seek federal funding to help transform the struggling Prince George's Hospital Center in Cheverly into a regional disaster emergency center.

"If we can fund banks that are too big to fail, we'd better fund hospitals that are too good to fail," said U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) of Baltimore.

Along with U.S. Rep. Donna Edwards (D-Dist.4) of Fort Washington, Mikulski said they will ask for $5 million to $25 million to help upgrade the regional trauma center before the federal budget is approved in October.

Mikulski said she would seek $5 million, while Edwards set her goal at $25 million, the maximum amounts the individual members are allowed to earmark in the Senate and House. State officials estimate it will cost at least $156 million for the project.

"We're going to go for as much as we can get," said Mikulski, who later called the funding a "major down payment" for the center.

The news conference at the hospital marks the first public support since state officials announced in February the possibility of using federal homeland security money to upgrade the county-owned facility, which has been losing money for more than a decade because of a large number of uninsured patients.

Plans call for combining the hospital with the University of Maryland Medical system and Andrews Air Force Base in a new operating partnership. In addition to providing capital for the hospital to improve services, the Cheverly center would be upgraded to handle mass casualties in the event of a disaster in the nation's capital.

"I know the governor's office has requested $156 million, but there's no earmark that can do that," Mikulski said in a meeting with local leaders and hospital officials. "We're advocating, not for the local, but for the federal [emergency need]. Our argument will be that this is a regional facility serving national needs."

The funding request would be handled as both the House and Senate hammer out the health and labor portion of the federal budget, to be paid by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The new project comes as an independent committee tries to find new owners for the county's three troubled hospitals: the Cheverly trauma center, Laurel Regional Hospital and the Bowie Health Campus.

Though they serve 180,000 patients a year, the high numbers of uninsured and underinsured patients have caused the system to lose about $12 million per year, requiring regular local and state government bailouts.

If new buyers are found later this summer, the state and county will give the new owners $174 million over five years to upgrade and rebuild the aging hospitals.

Prince George's County Executive Jack B. Johnson (D) told Mikulski before the news conference that the federal government must spend more on the center, which takes emergency cases from as far south as St. Mary's County.

"It is a regional center, not just ours. The federal and state government must be involved," Johnson said. "Without the resources of the federal government, this hospital is not going to be able to move itself [forward]."

Johnson said the county has spent $73 million on the hospitals since he took office in 2002.

State Sen. David Harrington (D-Dist. 47) of Cheverly told Mikulski and Edwards that the government must fix the nation's health care system so that hospitals aren't left with losses for caring for uninsured patients.

"The question is, when patients cannot pay, who pays?" he said. "If we close that gap, that will take a lot of pressure off [the hospitals]."

Mikulski said leaders are moving forward with health reform and said she would do her best.

"What's lacking is not the will, but the wealth," she said.

E-mail Daniel Valentine at dvalentine@gazette.net.