FEMA Awards Over $5M to Mass National Guard for COVID-19 Response

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BOSTON — The Federal Emergency Management Agency will be sending more than $5 million to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to reimburse the Massachusetts National Guard for the costs of medical operations and logistical support during the COVID-19 pandemic.
 
The $5,080,750 Public Assistance grant will reimburse the Massachusetts National Guard for the cost of providing medical staff and setting up temporary hospitals to handle COVID patients between March and September 2020.
 
In addition to setting up and staffing the temporary hospitals, Guard members provided medical and general purpose forces to cope with staffing shortfalls at the Holyoke Soldiers Home; to plan, coordinate, and perform large scale mobile COVID-19 sample collection; and to provide care at long-term care facilities, rest homes, and assisted living facilities.
 
The Guard also provided security at temporary hospitals and shelters as well as transportation and logistical support to the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency (MEMA), handling the transportation, warehousing, inventory management, and distribution of personal protective equipment (PPE).
 
"FEMA is pleased to be able to assist the Massachusetts National Guard with these costs," said FEMA Region 1 Regional Administrator Lori Ehrlich. "Providing resources for our partners on the front lines of the pandemic fight is critical to their success, and our success as a nation."
 
FEMA's Public Assistance program is an essential source of funding for states and communities recovering from a federally declared disaster or emergency.
 
So far, FEMA has provided more than $1.4 billion in Public Assistance grants to Massachusetts to reimburse the commonwealth for pandemic-related expenses.
 
Additional information about FEMA's Public Assistance program is available at https://www.fema.gov/public-assistance-local-state-tribal-and-non-profit. To learn more about the COVID-19 response in Massachusetts, visit https://www.fema.gov/disaster/4496

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North Adams Regional Reopens With Ribbon-Cutting Celebration

By Tammy DanielsiBerkshires Staff

BHS President and CEO Darlene Rodowicz welcomes the gathering to the celebration of the hospital's reopening 10 years to the day it closed. 
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The joyful celebration on Thursday at North Adams Regional Hospital was a far cry from the scene 10 years ago when protests and tears marked the facility's closing
 
Hospital officials, local leaders, medical staff, residents and elected officials gathered under a tent on the campus to mark the efforts over the past decade to restore NARH and cut the ribbon officially reopening the 136-year-old medical center. 
 
"This hospital under previous ownership closed its doors. It was a day that was full of tears, anger and fear in the Northern Berkshire community about where and how residents would be able to receive what should be a fundamental right for everyone — access to health care," said Darlene Rodowicz, president and CEO of Berkshire Health Systems. 
 
"Today the historic opportunity to enhance the health and wellness of Northern Berkshire community is here. And we've been waiting for this moment for 10 years. It is the key to keeping in line with our strategic plan which is to increase access and support coordinated county wide system of care." 
 
Berkshire Medical Center in Pittsfield, under the BHS umbrella, purchased the campus and affiliated systems when Northern Berkshire Healthcare declared bankruptcy and closed on March 28, 2014. NBH had been beset by falling admissions, reductions in Medicare and Medicaid payments, and investments that had gone sour leaving it more than $30 million in debt. 
 
BMC was able to reopen the ER as an emergency satellite facility and slowly restored and enhanced medical services including outpatient surgery, imaging, dialysis, pharmacy and physician services. 
 
But it would take a slight tweak in the U.S. Health and Human Services' regulations — thank to U.S. Rep. Richie Neal — to bring back inpatient beds and resurrect North Adams Regional Hospital 
 
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