The Business Council of New Orleans and the River Region has worked tirelessly to encourage leaders at Tulane and LSU to work out their differences with respect to a governance model for the New Orleans academic medical center. Facilitated by DHH Secretary Alan Levine, a draft memorandum of understanding was hammered out last week and offered to both university boards for approval at special meetings called for that purpose only.
The negotiation teams were made up of the most senior leaders from both institutions–including the presidents of the universities as well as the chairmen of their respective university boards.
The Tulane Board of Administrators ratified the document as drafted. The LSU Board of Supervisors made unilateral changes before approving a version to which Tulane had obviously not agreed. We call on the LSU Board of Supervisors to reconvene as soon as possible and affirm the document that their leaders developed.
A state of the art medical center which provides cutting edge research, residency training and excellent health care for all is crucial to an improved quality of life for our citizenry. A new teaching hospital will have an enormous, positive economic development impact on our city.
We urge the LSU Board of Supervisors to do the right thing for all parties: Reconvene, adopt the memorandum as originally agreed to and improve the quality of life for the people of Louisiana.
Gregory Rusovich
Chairman
Bob Brown
Managing Director
Ron Forman
Academic Medical Center Task Force
New Orleans Business Council
New Orleans