Hospitals Los Angeles County Finances

The Budget Conference Committee of the state Legislature voted Friday to support a request by Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) to allocate $500,000 to launch a comprehensive rape treatment and services center at Mission Community Hospital in Panorama City. If the money is approved in a vote on the state budget scheduled for this weekend, the center would house the first Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) in the San Fernando Valley, where an estimated 500 rapes were reported last year.

A new state law requiring structural improvements to help older hospitals survive an earthquake could force the closure of Ojai's only hospital and cost other local institutions millions of dollars over the next decade. According to hospital industry projections, about half of the state's 2,700 medical buildings at 450 hospital sites must be reinforced or rebuilt at a cost of $10 billion to meet stiff seismic standards imposed after the 1994 Northridge earthquake.

Gov. Pete Wilson is expected to step into the escalating political fracas over the size of a replacement hospital for County-USC Medical Center, and sources say he will side with the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, perhaps as early as today, in their efforts to build a 600-bed facility. County officials said at the supervisors' weekly board meeting Tuesday that they expect Wilson to veto a bill by state Sen.

Gov. Pete Wilson is expected to step into the escalating political fracas over the size of a replacement hospital for County-USC Medical Center, and sources say he will side with the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, perhaps as early as today, in their efforts to build a 600-bed facility. County officials said at the supervisors' weekly board meeting Tuesday that they expect Wilson to veto a bill by state Sen.

A new state law requiring structural improvements to help older hospitals survive an earthquake could force the closure of Ojai's only hospital and cost other local institutions millions of dollars over the next decade. According to hospital industry projections, about half of the state's 2,700 medical buildings at 450 hospital sites must be reinforced or rebuilt at a cost of $10 billion to meet stiff seismic standards imposed after the 1994 Northridge earthquake.

The Budget Conference Committee of the state Legislature voted Friday to support a request by Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) to allocate $500,000 to launch a comprehensive rape treatment and services center at Mission Community Hospital in Panorama City. If the money is approved in a vote on the state budget scheduled for this weekend, the center would house the first Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) in the San Fernando Valley, where an estimated 500 rapes were reported last year.