East Jeff MDs to oppose Lagasse

By Christopher Tidmore
Continuing Writer

Logically Elton Lagasse should be the frontrunner for Jefferson Parish President. As a past school board member, former schools superintendent, longtime District 5 Councilmember, and current Councilman At-Large – elected to the last without any opposition – his ubiquity of name recognition and his strong support on both the East and West Banks should make him a prohibitive favorite.

That is, if he can only raise the money to run, not an easy task when he has alienated the single biggest financial constituency of contributors in the suburban parish, medical doctors on the East Bank.

Reportedly, Metairie physicians remain furious with Lagasse’s outspoken support for Children’s Hospital to gain management control of East Jefferson Medical Center instead of rival HCA. So much so that the medical community is allegedly threatening to boycott any campaign contributions to the Councilman’s campaign for the Presidency. And to use their influence, extensive in Jefferson, to make sure contributors in other industries do as well.

If this is true, the opposition will hurt. With only $60,000 in the bank, Lagasse can hardly afford yard signs and push cards in sufficient numbers, much less the TV and campaign infrastructure necessary to run a modern, parishwide campaign.

Political Insiders report to The Louisiana Weekly that these doctors are “hell-bent” on blocking the Councilman at-Large’s path to the Jeff Parish Presidency, believing that his interference deliberately sabotaged the chances of Health Corporation of America obtaining the management contract of East Jefferson Hospital, when a deal had been constructed to satisfy concerns on both sides of the river.

Rising levels of deficits and unfunded liabilities threaten the ability of the two parish owned facilities to maintain their extensive medical staffing requirements to remain ‘category one’ medical centers. The East Jefferson medical community–and the EJ Board itself–was united in seeking HCA over rivals Children’s Hospital and Ochsner to obtain the management contract for both East and West Jefferson Hospitals.

Almost as United as the West Bank political establishment–and the WJ Board–was in rendering the hospital contract to the management team of Children’s/Touro, with whose leadership much of the West Bank political world maintains personal relationships.

Seeing the political impasse, the corporate hierarchy at HCA agreed that they would only pursue the east bank hospital contract. A resolution seemed at hand, but, Lagasse, a Metairie Councilman before his election to the At-Large post, broke with the doctors and the East Bank business establishment that favored HCA’s ability to financially re-vitalize East Jefferson hospital, and blocked the division of the contract. He supported Children’s Hospital to manage both facilities no matter what the local medical community desired.

Supporters of Lagasse’s position, equally held by fellow at large Councilman Chris Roberts (a West Banker), argued that the management contract the hospital should not be divided. That had been the point of the original ‘Request for Proposals’.” Equally, the two Councilmen argued that the financially superior offer made by HCA should not be considered over a local operator.

HCA withdrew from the bid process, spending the promised hundreds of millions of dollars on a hospital project in St. Louis instead.

This article originally published in the April 6, 2015 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.