Miami-Dade County commissioners are ready to put officials of Jackson Health System under the knife.
While some would say they mean it literally, we are hoping the commission is simply saying they are ready to do life-saving surgery to help the county's top health services provider out of their financial bind.
The literal option seems a bit messy.
"Jackson doesn't need a Band Aid. It needs a lobotomy," said Commissioner Pepe Diaz during a special meeting of the commission on Wednesday.
He was referring to the $17 million Jackson hospitals are hemorrhaging each month. Jackson is projected to have a jaw-dropping $229 million deficit for 2010. Part of the plan to relieve the heavy burden is to take an ax, not a scalpel, to the 12,000 nurses and other employees of the health system.
Union heads have negotiated a 45-day lay off-free period, but some estimates have as many as 2,000 people losing their jobs because of the hospitals' financial woes.
On Tuesday, Mayor Carlos Alvarez has taken the drastic step of proposing the removal of the current Health Trust that oversees Jackson's finances and replacing it with a 7-member board of his choosing.
Jackson CEO Dr. Eneida Roldan told commissioners she was not ready to present her recovery plan at the meeting, which may speed up the takeover by an impatient bunch of politicians.
"The problems we face today are not sudden. They are not new, nor are they newly large, but they must be addressed," she said. "I want to stress the countless hours that management, the board and our partners and unions are dedicated to save Jackson."
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The commission is holding a second session on recovery plans this afternoon where the board will likely vote on Alvarez's take over plan.
