Providence Holy Cross Medical Center Ignores Community, Environmental Concerns With Planned Expansion of Mission Hill...( Project proceeds despite non-compl...),Health

Project proceeds despite non-compliance with California Environmental

Quality Act (CEQA).

LOS ANGELES, May 12 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Providence Holy Cross Medical Center (PHCMC) today went ahead with the planned expansion of its Holy Cross Medical Center even as Superior Court Judge Thomas I. McKnew, Jr. has upheld charges that the approval process was significantly flawed. The groundbreaking ceremony held today appears to be an attempt to create "facts-on-the-ground" that would complicate a likely requirement for Providence to complete an Environmental Impact Review before the project is properly approved.

The Community Advocates for a Responsible Expansion (CARE) Coalition, a group of community, church and environmental groups from the San Fernando Valley, has been engaged in the process to ensure that PHCMC's irresponsible actions do not result in significant unmitigated environmental impacts. "We're for the expansion but we can't support the proposal until they do an environmental mitigation," said CARE Coalition member Wayde Hunter.

The hospital is breaking ground even though an 8-5 majority of the City Council voted in November to require an Environmental Impact Report. Judge McKnew has already rejected the hospital's argument that the City was free to consider this vote an approval of the hospital's expansion because of a rule in the City's municipal code requiring a two-thirds vote of the City Council to uphold environmental appeals. The litigation is likely to result in overturning the hospital's permission to go forward as well as the City's rules for handling environmental appeals.

Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alarcon, whose district includes the Mission Hills area where the hospital is located, continues to lead efforts to ensure PHCMC respects the local community's concerns in regards to the hospital expansion. Said Councilman Alarcon, "I am disappointed that Holy Cross has decid
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