Editorials

Ask first, then offer support of the town

Everyone, it seems, has an idea about how property near the Highway 85 and Highway 17 interchange should be developed. But nothing's quite captured the town's imagination like the proposal to build a children's hospital there.

In a letter to supporters, dated Jan. 6, 2000, Richard Fox, M.D., reported that "Los Gatos Mayor Steve Blanton ... stated that he thought that we should not only have a children's hospital here but that we should aim to make it the best one in the world."

The mayor has announced that he's putting together a task force to explore all possibilities of the prospective hospital, including fundraising, exploration of possible sites and the raising of public awareness.

This is an amazing response to a brief non-agendized presentation to the Town Council Dec. 6 where the idea of a pediatric hospital in the North Forty was simply brought to the council's attention. By all reports, the speech given at that meeting by 10-year-old Marie Starks about her brother's battle with adult respiratory distress was an emotional tour de force.

Small wonder some town officials and community leaders are caught up in the prospect of making Los Gatos home to a world-class children's hospital.

We aren't opposed to the idea, and we don't object to the town appointing a task force to explore the idea, but we do object to the appearance the town has given that it has endorsed the hospital and that the only issues that remain are logistic ones.

There are many questions to be answered before the town or its representatives should endorse this suggestion. For instance, what about the soccer fields, the school, the affordable housing, the parks and all the other ideas citizens put on the table not so long ago when the North Forty was the topic du jour?

The idea of a children's hospital has been kicking around for some time. Studies have been done, and political battles have been waged--successfully--to keep some of these same pediatricians from realizing their goal.

Dr. Fox says that while no decision has been made as to whether the hospital would be proprietary or nonprofit, he expects that only a nonprofit could generate the necessary grants. And that brings up the issue of the state of hospitals today.

Nonprofit hospitals are struggling to survive. It wasn't that long ago that Columbia Good Samaritan Hospital was plain old nonprofit Good Samaritan Hospital.

And what about cost? It cost some $140 million to build the Lucile Salter Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford. And the proximity of that hospital brings up the question of duplication of effort.

The time to ask questions is before the mayor announces that there should be a children's hospital in Los Gatos--the best in the world.

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Editorials: Children's hospital

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