In March, Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles and the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles joined with the American Civil Liberties Union in suing the county to stop it from shutting Rancho and cutting the beds from USC. The federal Legal Services Corporation (LSC) funds both Neighborhood Legal Services and the Legal Aid Foundation.
Last week, federal Judge Florence-Marie Cooper issued a temporary order in the case stopping the county from making the cuts. According to the Los Angeles Times, Cooper said the cuts would cause "dangerous delays of needed medical treatment resulting in unnecessary deaths, strokes, heart attacks, amputations, renal failure, blindness, seizures, severe pain and increased risk of infection."
I asked LSC Communications Director Eric Kleiman how much money the federal government gives to the Legal Aid Foundation of L.A. and the Neighborhood Legal Services of L.A. and whether their suit against the county is in keeping with LSC's vision. They received $6.3 million and $3.2 million respectively in 2002, Kleiman responded by e-mail.
"The closure of the Los Angeles area's only publicly funded rehabilitation hospital, and the removal of 100 beds from the county's largest medical center, would have left countless low-income people in and around Los Angeles with nowhere to turn when faced with urgent health care problems," wrote Kleiman. "The litigation filed by two LSC grantees to prevent these cuts is intended to prevent a catastrophe for poor people who rely on these facilities to stay in good health -- and, indeed, in some instances, to stay alive. This suit falls well within our grantees' congressional mandate to serve the legal needs of the area's low-income population, and its merits were endorsed by the federal judge who issued the order in their favor."
If you're a taxpayer, this is your lawsuit -- and you're winning. Meanwhile, trapped between a judge's ruling on Prop. 187 and a judge's ruling here, Los Angelenos are losing not only money, but also their recourse to representative government.
Editor's note: No emails please. The Dr. Thomas Garthwaite mentioned in this article is not related to Jonathan Garthwaite, editor of Townhall.com.