A U.S. Bankruptcy Court ruling on the pending sales of Holy Family Hospitals in Haverhill and Methuen and other Steward Health Care properties will have to wait until at least next week after a planned hearing Tuesday was postponed again.
Sen. Pavel M. Payano, speaking on WHAV this week, said the state will backup Lawrence General Hospital’s purchase of Holy Family, but changes will be noticeable.
“We were able to work out a deal with the state. The state is supporting that project so both hospitals will remain open. The Haverhill hospital will probably look a little bit different than what it did before,” he said.
He explained having a single owner of all three campuses delivers benefits. “I think it make sense for Lawrence General to be, sort of, managing all three hospitals and ensuring that services are not duplicated, which will create efficiencies, would create savings that I hope would be able to be put back into the hospital to provide better services for our city needs.”
Echoing comments made last week Haverhill Mayor Melinda E. Barrett, Payano said improvements in Haverhill are long overdue. “I hope that Lawrence General is able to invest more into the ER, to modernize it a little bit and I think that they’re going to be creative about bringing in other services.”
The senator representing Lawrence, Methuen and Haverhill emphasized the biggest change is that private investors won’t be around to take a cut. “They’re going to be reinvesting it back into the hospital and into the community. All of us are very excited about that.”
Payano added a campus closing could mean “life or death” for a resident forced to drive a few minutes longer to another hospital outside the area. He said the unions—Massachusetts Nurses Association and SEIU 1199—were “on the ball” advocating for the local hospitals.
A Steward lawyer told a Bankruptcy Court judge last week that none of the deals to transfer Massachusetts hospitals to other operators have been consummated and they remain under mediation.
“We have not yet executed asset purchase agreements related to the six hospitals, but again, we are very close to the finish line and are still fully engaged in mediation,” Candace Arthur, one of Steward’s lawyers from the firm Weil, Gotshal & Manges, said Thursday. “We hope to be back before the court in very short order in connection with the Massachusetts hospitals and the transition there.”
Gov. Maura T. Healey said, “This is a very complicated deal and a complicated transaction, so not unusual to have a little bit more time…there have been a few different extensions. The important thing, though, is we’re moving forward,” she told reporters after an unrelated event at the State House.
(State House News Service contributed to this report.)