Two hospital groups have expressed interest in taking over the slated-for-closure Long Island College Hospital in Brownstone Brooklyn — but any potential deal has been stymied by SUNY Downstate’s refusal to open their books, according to a LICH doctor association.
Representatives from Hackensack University Medical Center sat down last Friday with LICH doctors to talk about a possible takeover and North Shore-LIJ discussed the same possibility with a LICH doctor, spokesmen for the two hospital groups confirmed.
SUNY Downstate wants to shutter the 506-bed Cobble Hill hospital — which it said loses $4 million a month — but a lawsuit filed by doctor and nurse groups have held up the closure.
“Everybody would love to have a suitor, a knight in bright shining armor, but I don’t think that will happen until there’s more information [from SUNY] on the financial front,” said Dr. Toomas Sorra, president of Concerned Physicians of LICH.
A SUNY Downstate spokesman maintained that financial figures for the hospital are publicly available.
“If there was a legitimate interested buyer for LICH, SUNY Downstate would be delighted,” said SUNY Downstate spokesman Steve Greenberg. “If Dr. Soora has interested suitors he should refer them to [SUNY Downstate.]”
Community groups slammed SUNY over what they perceive as torpedoing of efforts to keep open the only hospital directly serving Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill and Downtown Brooklyn.
“Not opening the books would doom any sale with any potential suitor,” said Cobble Hill Association president Roy Sloane, who believes real-estate interests want to turn the site into luxury housing.
“I believe there is a plan to kill and liquidate LICH,” he said.
The head of the state nurses union said her workers would support any hospital group that kept LICH open.
“We’re ready and willing to work with any operator that will commit to putting quality care for Brooklyn patients before profits,” said New York State Nurses Association executive director Jill Furillo.
Any hospital takeover would be overseen by the state Public Health and Health Planning Council and signed off on by the state Department of Health, according to a DOH spokesman.
SUNY Downstate acquired LICH in 2011 and announced it would close the ailing hospital earlier this year, but Supreme Court Justice Johnny Lee Baynes issued a temporary restraining order barring SUNY from closing the hospital until it follows open meeting laws.
Baynes set a May 2 hearing to review the case.
jsaul@nypost.com