From: "Rich Gauszka" 

No national health care needed here as dumping is cheaper

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/03/24/D8GHV8KO5.html

Authorities are examining a surveillance tape that shows an elderly woman
wandering Skid Row in a hospital gown and slippers as they investigate the
practice of hospitals and police agencies dumping homeless people downtown.

Carol Ann Reyes, 63, of Gardena, was taken from a Kaiser Permanente
hospital in Bellflower on Monday to the downtown area known as Skid Row,
authorities said.

A surveillance camera outside the Union Rescue Mission showed Reyes walking
from the direction of a taxi that had just driven away. She wandered the
street for about three minutes before a mission staff member brought her
inside.

City officials have been looking into the alleged dumping of homeless
people in Skid Row, a ramshackle area downtown.

Several hospitals have acknowledged that they put some discharged indigent
patients with nowhere else to go into taxicabs headed to the area because
it offers a chance for getting services and shelter. Los Angeles police
also are investigating whether other law enforcement agencies dump people
without anywhere else to go downtown.

"We have been looking into homeless dumping for some time, and this
(tape) gives us another example of what has been going on," said Frank
Mateljan, a spokesman for the city attorney's office.

Diana Bonta, vice president of public affairs for Kaiser Southern
California, said the hospital attempted to find a shelter for Reyes, but
when that failed, it was determined that she would be taken to the Union
Rescue Mission. Hospital officials are trying to find out why Reyes, who
was in the hospital after suffering a bad fall, was left on the street
still wearing her hospital gown and slippers.

The incident violated hospital policy and will not occur again, she said.

"We have a policy of treating our patients with compassion and
care," Bonta said. "This should not have happened."

Andy Bales, president the Union Rescue Mission, where Reyes remained, said
the incident was the third in the past week in which security cameras
caught taxis dropping people in the area. The problem will continue until a
coordinated discharge plan between hospitals and shelters is created, he
said.

"We just can't drop people off like baggage," he said. "We
can't have a society where these people have nowhere to turn when they need
care."

State Sen. Gil Cedillo of Los Angeles, a Democrat, has introduced a bill
that would prohibit any arresting agency from taking people who need drug
treatment, mental health services or shelter outside their jurisdiction.

Los Angeles County officials are also considering establishing five
regional homeless centers in an attempt to reduce dumping, the Los Angeles
Times reported Friday.

The regional homeless centers plan would spread the responsibility of
caring for the homeless to suburbs instead of concentrating it downtown,
the newspaper said. Each 30-bed center would operate 24- hours a day and
would accept people from hospitals, police and care providers. The goal
would be to find the resident permanent housing and services such as mental
health and substance abuse treatment, officials said.

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