It was a “Thelma & Louise” moment. It came at a rally yesterday, where mayoral candidate Bill de Blasio — standing in for Geena Davis’ Thelma — whined about The Post’s pointing out that the same Susan Sarandon who now rallies against the loss of St. Vincent’s hospital once helped kill its only real chance of surviving.
That was back in 2008, when St. Vincent’s was recovering from bankruptcy. The hospital reached a redevelopment plan under which it would sell some property for condos, and then build a state-of-the-art medical tower on another part of its property.
Sarandon fought that plan. At a meeting of the Landmarks Preservation Committee, the well-heeled actress attacked St. Vincent’s by saying, “I would not want to bring my children there.” She deserves an Oscar for now suggesting she never wanted it closed, given how she and her fellow activists favored “alternatives” that didn’t exist and held up redevelopment long enough that the money wouldn’t come in time to save St. Vincent’s. So Greenwich Village will now get condos, but not the modern medical tower.
As we’ve noted before, the main force behind hospital closures is that the city has too many unused hospital beds. No doubt these beds will get even more expensive and difficult to maintain, now that a state Supreme Court justice, Johnny Lee Baynes, has decreed that Long Island College Hospital in Brooklyn reopen, regardless of the millions it loses each day.
If you wonder why our hospital system is being driven off the fiscal cliff, a good place to start might be our out-of-control judges and not-in-my-backyard actresses.