A consultant group
would run the hospital for at least a year and review each department.
In response to a series of medical lapses and patient deaths, Los
Angeles County officials put forth a plan Wednesday to hand over
day-to-day management of Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center to
a private consulting firm. The move would mark the first time the
county had ceded operations at one of its hospitals to outside
managers, and it underscored the county's struggles to fix years of
problems at the Willowbrook medical center, near Watts. Under the plan,
which the Board of Supervisors is expected to approve Tuesday, the
county would pay Navigant Consulting up to $13.25 million to take over
from current county managers for at least a year and complete a
top-to-bottom review of how the facility operates. The firm could begin
work as early as Nov. 1. County officials said the shift would provide
much more oversight of the hospital, with 23 consultants from Navigant
doing the jobs that five county managers now perform. [more 
]
- Pictured above: Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally (D-Compton), center, and U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) and residents gather outside Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center in Willowbrook, south of Watts, calling for the resignation of Dr. Thomas Garthwaite, director of the county health department.