The Record — Editorial
Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Bergen County Executive Dennis McNerney wants to build some consensus. He wants the two hospitals that are opposed to the reopening of Pascack Valley Hospital to sit down with the hospital that wants to reopen it, so the opponents can be persuaded to sign on to the plan.

In calling for the meeting between Hackensack University Medical Center, which wants to reopen Pascack, and The Valley Hospital in Ridgewood and Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, which are opposed, McNerney says, “We have to put petty politics aside and make it happen.”

McNerney, a Democrat, is joined in this effort by the Democratic county freeholders.

They are not putting politics aside, however. They are injecting politics into what is supposed to be a neutral and objective decision made solely by the state health commissioner.

It is not up to local politicians to “make it happen.”

McNerney and the Democratic freeholders have no expertise in gauging the medical need for the proposed 128-bed hospital in Westwood and no role in the state’s application process.

Instead, they are engaged in an attempt to pressure the two opposing hospitals to end their opposition and support the reopening.

Did Hackensack, which is no stranger to exerting political pressure, encourage McNerney and the Democratic freeholders to take on this conciliatory mission?

Using elected Democratic officials to exert political pressure has already tainted the hospital’s reputation — in the hiring of former state Sen. Joseph Coniglio, a Democrat from Paramus, to do “community relations.” Coniglio was convicted on federal charges last spring of steering millions of dollars in state funds to the hospital while on its payroll.

Staff Writer Mary Jo Layton has reported that various Hackensack board members have helped to underwrite Bergen County’s Democratic machine and powerful lawmakers in Trenton.

And if you are a generous political donor, you expect to be heard when you have a request of your local politician.

The Record has also reported that the Bergen freeholders initially said they would not take sides in this hospital dispute. But they changed their minds and pledged support to Hackensack last winter. That happened at a meeting that was, as Layton reported, “jammed with construction workers led by Richard ‘Buzzy’ Dressel — a board member of Hackensack’s foundation who also is a leader of the Bergen County Democratic Party [and] the business manager of a local union itching for renovation work at [a reopened] Pascack. … They grabbed all the seats before the session began, so that employees bused in from opposing hospitals were stuck in an overflow room.”

Hackensack’s application for permission from the state to reopen the Pascack site is pending. The hospital asked for more time this summer when it learned that state health department staff were preparing a recommendation against it. The main questions are whether the region needs another hospital and whether reopening Pascack would damage existing hospitals, particularly Englewood.

Those are questions best answered by the state — not by McNerney and the freeholders.

But they are doing their part to help Hackensack. They want to convene a meeting among the chief executive officers of Hackensack, Valley and Englewood early next month, to help them “work out their differences,” according to Democratic Freeholder Vernon Walton. And the Freeholder Board plans to hold its own September meeting at the Westwood hospital site in order to hear from residents on the issue.

All this civic activity would be much more heartening if the county executive and the freeholders were neutral, if they were acting as a resource for all of their constituents.

Instead, they are doing Hackensack’s bidding.

Read the editorial at northjersey.com