As the nation faced the continued threat of terrorist attacks in2002, Los Angeles County officials scrambled to prepare while theirhealth care system was crumbling.
Originally facing an $800 million deficit by 2005, the Board ofSupervisors voted in the early summer to close 11 health clinics,convert High Desert Hospital in Lancaster to an outpatient clinicand close Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center inDowney.
This action saved enough money to reduce the deficit to $404million, but the supervisors faced stiff opposition from thecounty's unions and health care advocates, who staged protests.
In a long-shot bid to bolster the ailing health system,Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky proposed a parcel tax to inject thesystem with $168 million a year, targeted to preserve the county'strauma centers, emergency rooms and for bioterrorism preparations.
Measure B - The Preservation of Trauma Centers and EmergencyMedical Services; Bioterrorism Response - was placed on the Nov. 5ballot, and 73 percent of voters approved, giving the measure themost votes any initiative or candidate on the ballot received.
The passage of Measure B, along with optimistic comments by stateand federal officials, convinced the supervisors they would be ableto keep open two hospitals, Olive View-UCLA Medical Center in Sylmarand Harbor-UCLA Medical Center.
Boosted by the success of the measure, the supervisors persuadedGov. Gray Davis to ask the Bush administration for waivers offederal health funding rules to help the cash-strapped county healthsystem.
The plan, released in late November, would provide the countywith $150 million to $200 million a year, leaving the county lessthan $100 million to cut from its $2.4 billion health budget.
Meanwhile, with the help of a nearly $30 million federal grant toprepare for biological or chemical terrorist attack, the countybegan purchasing protective suits for health care workers and gavemoney to the county's 81 hospitals to construct decontaminationfacilities for chemical or radiological terrorist attacks.
The county was also struck with its first few cases of the WestNile virus and an outbreak of Legionnaire's Disease at the downtownGood Samaritan Hospital, where nine patients became ill, includingtwo who died.
In early December, county Public Health Officer Dr. JonathanFielding announced plans to vaccinate up to 20,000 public healthworkers and hospital emergency employees against smallpox as thefirst step for potential bioterrorism attacks.
The plan eventually calls for the vaccination of a broader groupof health workers and firefighters, paramedics and law enforcementpersonnel. The U.S. government may offer the vaccinations to thepublic in late 2003 or early 2004.
Despite these preparations, critics said the county is still ill-prepared for a biological attack, noting that hospitals are alreadyexceeding 80 percent of capacity and wouldn't be able to handle alarge number of ill people seeking treatment.
Coming at an awkward moment in the midst of the health crisis,the supervisors voted in early December to give final approval to an$820 million project to rebuild County/USC Medical Center, theearthquake-damaged landmark that gained fame on the soap opera,'General Hospital.' The project is the largest in county history.
The supervisors, presented with the first $2.5 million increasein the project's price - said they wanted the Department of PublicWorks to closely monitor the project, fearing contractors couldsubmit an endless list of cost-overrun requests that could run theprice up to $1.2 billion.
