Community Board 1 Joins the Fight!

Manhattan's Community Board 1 joined their neighbor CB2 and The Coalition for a New Village Hospital in calling for a "land lock" on the old St. Vincent's site. Board Chair Julie Menin commended the Coalition's work to a packed meeting. Coalition members Yetta Kurland, Paul Newell and Jonathan Slaff all spoke to the Board.

As more and more community groups sign on to CNVH's mission, the tide on this issue is beginning to turn. CB1 passed the resolution unanimously on July 27th.

Manhattan Community Board 1 Resolution on St. Vincent's

Coalition for a New Village Hospital holds Planning Meeting

Over 125 people turned up for Thursday night's planning meeting at Our Lady of Pompeii Church in the West Village. In addition to community members, attendees included representatives of numerous community groups – including PTAs, block associations, civil rights groups, civic associations.

The meeting, chaired by Civil Rights Attorney Yetta Kurland, discussed various approaches to our demand for a new village hospital.

Here's a video of Ms. Kurland explaining the state of the legal challenges:

At this point, we were joined briefly by Julie Menin, Chair of Community Board One. Ms. Menin discussed the joint taskforce of Community Boards 1, 2, 3 and 4 on health care – and committed to work towards a hospital for the lower West Side. She also addressed the stresses already being felt on New York Downtown Hospital (formerly Beekman) in lower Manhattan.

Here she is discussing the role these hospitals play in the event of a homeland security emergency.

After these introductory presentations, the bulk of the meeting was composed of community ideas on how to fight back. Some of the consensus ideas were:

• A campaign of Street Actions at the site of old St. Vincent's (more on this soon)
• Work with the Community Boards to help keep the St. Vincent's site designated for hospital use.
• Outreach to elected officials
• Art and Culture installations
• A complaint to the Attorney General's office was circulated.

Things are developing very quickly, so watch this space...