A Macomb County medical center that treats the poor who suffer from major injuries or chronic illness has become a political football between County Executive Mark Hackel and the Board of Commissioners, with a bureaucratic dispute likely resulting in another court fight between the two branches of government.
The Martha T. Berry Medical Care Facility, considered one of the crown jewels of county government, emerged as the center of an ongoing partisan political fight more than a decade ago, with some Republican officials proposing the facility be cut loose from the county and put into private hands.
In 2009, with Martha T. Berry dependent on county taxpayer subsidies skyrocketing above $5 million a year, the Board of Commissioners entered into a cost-cutting, joint operating agreement with the Social Services Board that oversees the 217-bed facility located on the outskirts of Mount Clemens.
Relying upon employee concessions and moves that maximized federal financial reimbursements from Medicare and Medicaid, the overhaul eliminated the subsidy within two years, which some officials labeled “miraculous.”
In contrast, the Hackel administration claims quality medical care suffered in the process and that county-owned Martha T. Berry, similar to a nursing home, has become a revolving door for nurses and other health care providers.
The power struggle between Hackel and the Social Services Board reached the breaking point last year when the SSB (also known as the Human Services Board) sued the executive, insisting that they controlled Martha T. Berry. Hackel countered that the voter-approved county charter put him in charge of the facility.
In August, a county Circuit Court judge ruled that Hackel has little authority over the medical center. As a result, with a Dec. 31 deadline approaching, the county executive has pursued a full divestiture of Martha T. Berry from all county connections, including payroll, bookkeeping, human resources, legal counsel and even online computer functions.
Though the building remains in county hands, in September the administration had fiber-optic lines that run through Martha T. Berry disconnected. Cables providing online service to several other buildings in the county’s Elizabeth Road complex in Mount Clemens were re-routed around the medical center at a cost of about $15,000.
The largest cost for taxpayers so far has come in the area of legal fees: Approximately $450,000 in expenses for the executive’s office and the SSB combined.
Still, the biggest dispute, which may result in more litigation, revolves around Hackel’s insistence that, if he does not have control over operations at the facility, at the end of the year the 300-member Martha T. Berry staff will no longer be county employees and their place within the county pension system will be terminated.
Established in 1949, Martha T. Berry serves as home to some of Macomb County’s most chronically ill residents. Patients range from teenagers to senior citizens who need long-term care because of accidents, illness or disease that has left them paralyzed, comatose or incapacitated.
For the poor, Martha T. Berry is viewed as a safety net, a care facility of last resort for the “medically fragile and financially indigent.”
Beyond the health care issues, the lingering power struggle between the Board of Commissioners and the executive may be entering a new chapter as the new charter/executive form of government reaches the 4-year mark.
County commissioners in October unanimously passed a bipartisan resolution asserting Hackel has overstepped his bounds and demanded that the executive preserve the Martha T. Berry staff as county employees who are included in the county pension system. If he declines to do so, the county board authorized a lawsuit to block the executive’s moves.
Meanwhile, Hackel maintains he will not settle for a hybrid system in which the three-member SSB is labeled the employer at the facility and the executive’s office is denied the ability to oversee employee hiring, firing and labor contract negotiations. He has rejected offers to negotiate amendments to the joint operating agreement.
Board of Commissioners Chairman Dave Flynn complains Hackel is taking a “my way or the highway” approach. The executive’s foes in this battle include labor unions who represent the employees and the county Retirement Commission.
“The executive basically took the toys out of the sandbox,” said Flynn, a Sterling Heights Democrat. “He put out a memo saying he was putting in place numerous punitive actions that would harm Martha T. Berry’s operations and hurt its ability to serve the public.”
As the county executive’s office moves toward cutting all ties with Martha T. Berry, Hackel, a Macomb Township Democrat who won re-election by a wide margin last week, said that it “just doesn’t make sense” that commissioners and the SSB continue to threaten legal action.
Assistant County Executive Al Lorenzo said commissioners maintain a narrative that Hackel is the bad guy in this scenario. But county board members, he said, are trying to cover up the “bad deal” -- a “stupid idea” -- of a joint operating agreement that gave the SSB selective oversight of the medical facility.
“This is the last vestige of the old ways (of the Board of Commissioners) and, by God, they’re determined to keep them,” said Lorenzo, former longtime president of Macomb Community College.
At the same time, a wrongful death lawsuit against the medical center that could potentially cost the county millions hangs over the politics of the situation. In response to the suit’s claims of patient mistreatment due to a lack of trained staff, the executive’s office may respond in pre-trial court proceedings that the employees targeted by the aggrieved family are not county employees. That could put the entire financial of a court decision on the SSB.
When Hackel took office in 2011 as Macomb’s first county executive, the Organizational Plan he put forward called for fully implementing the joint operating agreement that would make Martha T. Berry financially self-sufficient. The Board of Commissioners at that time was still in agreement that the facility’s employees and pensioners, including a multi-million dollar commitment to retiree health care, would be transitioned to the SSB.
In the first two years of the Hackel administration, several executive vetoes brought threats of legal action by the commissioners. The one court battle that ensued, centering on approval of government contracts, went to the state Court of Appeals where a victory was handed to the 13-member Board of Commissioners.
That issue has been put to rest. Lorenzo said a new round of litigation would have an upside in that it would sort out and resolve the disputes over Martha T. Berry.
“Litigation,” he said, “always produces clarification.”
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