thedrifter
02-22-07, 09:02 AM
Leaders take blame for wounded care woes <br />
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Health officials ‘surprised;’ lawmakers seeking solutions <br />
By William H. McMichael - Staff writer <br />
Posted : Thursday Feb 22, 2007 5:45:30 EST <br />
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The Army’s...
thedrifter
02-22-07, 02:42 PM
A Hospital Overdue for Treatment
$6 Million in Hand, D.C. Seeks Right Plan
By Sue Anne Pressley Montes
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 22, 2007; DZ01
The stately red-brick building with the carriage house and black iron fence has stood mostly vacant for years. But it is easy to look at the Old Naval Hospital on Capitol Hill and imagine when it was busy and vital, as a hospital for sailors and Marines recovering from wounds received in the Civil War.
Now, the property at 921 Pennsylvania Ave. SE is set for a new lease on life. Last week, the D.C. Office of Property Management began welcoming proposals for the 140-year-old building's "restoration, renovation and reuse." The District has allocated $6 million for the project, and many longtime champions of the historic facility are hoping it will be revived as some sort of neighborhood center.
"It's a real jewel of Capitol Hill that's been covered in all the muck and mire of the years," said Greg Richey, president of the Friends of the Old Naval Hospital, a nonprofit group of Capitol Hill residents. "And it can be a real center for the community if we can ever see it to the point where it is restored."
The 2 1/2 -story building was constructed at the close of the Civil War and opened as the "Naval Hospital, Washington City," on Oct. 1, 1866, with a 50-patient capacity. Its first patient was a 24-year-old black sailor named Benjamin Drummond, who had been shot in the shoulder and both legs during a battle off the Texas coast, according to the group. Hospital records show that his wounds were slow to heal, and Drummond was in great pain during his year-and-a-half stay.
The facility remained a Naval Hospital for 40 years, until 1906, and later served as a Hospital Corps Training School and a temporary home for veterans attending to business in Washington. After the Navy transferred jurisdiction over the building to the D.C. government in 1962, it was used for anti-poverty programs and leased to the private Center for Youth Services. But in recent years, it has been mostly empty, except for occasional use by a Neighborhood Advisory Commission.
The building, with its crumbling but gracious Greek Revival and Second Empire flourishes, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974. In 2000, the D.C. Council considered the building as a possible site for a mayoral mansion, if one were to be funded.
"It's tragically underutilized right now," said Lars Etzkorn, director of the Office of Property Management. "We encourage the submission of creative self-sustaining uses."
Proposals will be accepted until March 12. Etzkorn said the ideal tenant would be a group "sympathetic to the historic integrity" of the building.
This is the agency's second request for proposals for the building's future. In 2004, the Office of Property Management approved a plan that would have put a yoga institute on the site. But then-Mayor Anthony Williams, who wanted a broader community use of the building, opposed the selection.
As the latest debate gets underway, Richey says the Friends of the Old Naval Hospital "are not advocating for or against any particular use." He said the group, which formed in 1999, is just concerned about "this beautiful building right in the midst of our community, going to waste."
Located two blocks from Eastern Market and a 15-minute walk from the Supreme Court and the U.S. Capitol, the Old Naval Hospital is in the center of a thriving neighborhood. (Abraham Lincoln, who commissioned the hospital, is said to have insisted that the facility be within walking distance of Navy Yard and the Marine Barracks.) Etzkorn said the structure has had very little updating over the years, but an engineering assessment found the building to be sound. Most of the walls, doors and staircases are original.
"When you walk in, you know that you're in a Civil War structure," he said.
As a first step toward restoration, the Office of Property Management recently began refurbishing the original iron fence that surrounds the property. In the February edition of the Capitol Hill Restoration Society News, a plea was put out to the "good neighbors" who "have rescued pieces of the ONH fence that were at risk of destruction" to make arrangements to return them.
Richey said the developments are encouraging to a group that has worked so long to champion the building. But he is a bit concerned about the tight deadline for proposals.
"We've gone through years like this -- there's no reason not to extend it a couple of months to give people more time," he said. "We're not in a rush. We want it done right."
Ellie
thedrifter
02-24-07, 07:28 AM
Gates vows to improve outpatient care at Walter Reed
Facility reportedly full of pests, mold
By Ken Fireman, Bloomberg News | February 24, 2007
WASHINGTON -- Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates condemned as "unacceptable" the outpatient care problems encountered by hundreds of wounded U S troops at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and promised to correct them quickly.
Gates announced the creation of an independent panel to investigate conditions at the facility in Washington and vowed to hold those found responsible for the problems accountable.
"This is about our family," Gates said yesterday at a news conference at the medical facility. "And it appears to us that some of our family may not have been treated the way they should have been."
The Washington Post, in a series of articles earlier this week, reported that dozens of recuperating soldiers and Marines are put in dirty, mold-ridden, pest-infested housing. They and others have also faced daunting bureaucratic obstacles to obtaining needed follow-up care, the newspaper reported.
Gates praised the Post for reporting the problems and said he has seen nothing to indicate that its articles were "in any substantial way wrong."
He said the problems were with outpatient care and didn't extend to the medical care given wounded personnel in the main facility, which Gates called "world class."
The secretary said that he met with President Bush earlier yesterday to discuss the issue and that Bush "is understandably concerned."
In vowing to hold accountable those found responsible for the problems, Gates said "some people who are most directly involved" have already been relieved of their duties.
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said Gates was referring to "individuals who were in a direct supervisory role."
Whitman and White House spokesman Tony Fratto said there was no connection between the Walter Reed problems and the departure of Dr. William Winkenwerder Jr. as assistant defense secretary for health affairs. Whitman said Winkenwerder told his superiors last year that he wanted to leave government service.
The White House said Winkenwerder will be replaced by Dr. S. Ward Casscells , a professor at University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston.
The review panel will investigate conditions at Walter Reed and the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., Gates said. Two former Army secretaries, Togo West and Jack Marsh, will lead the inquiry.
The Senate Armed Services Committee plans to hold a hearing March 6 on conditions at Walter Reed, according to one member of the panel, Senator John W. Warner, a Virginia Republican.
Warner, a former Navy secretary and committee chairman, attended Gates's news conference and praised the secretary's handling of the issue.
Ellie