DATE: Monday, August 25, 1997               TAG: 9708250051

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B2   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 

DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS                      LENGTH:   38 lines

NEWPORT NEWS GENERAL IS IN CRITICAL CONDITION

Newport News General Hospital's financial woes reached the critical stage this week when the hospital said it failed to pay its employees and may not be able to pay them in two weeks, either.

Opened as a hospital for blacks in 1908, Newport News General has been battling financial disaster for more than eight months. Hospital officials say they are losing patients to competitors such as Riverside Regional Medical Center and Sentara Hampton General Hospital.

Now supporters and detractors wonder whether Newport News General might be better off serving the community another way.

``It is very clear that residents of its service area have voted with their feet and gone to other hospitals,'' says Paul Boynton, executive director of the Eastern Virginia Health Systems Agency.

``I really think that it's going to be terribly difficult to recapture that population, or a substantial portion of that population,'' Boynton said, adding that the facility could become a retirement community.

``I don't feel like I would be comfortable going there anymore,'' said former hospital board Chairman John H. Williams Jr., 62. ``I don't think they have the equipment, and I don't think they have the resources.''

Williams served as chairman for four months ending in February 1996, and he agrees it is something of a dinosaur.

Since January, the hospital has secured a $100,000 emergency loan from the city, laid off much of its work force, and trimmed services.

The hospital, one of only four historically black hospitals in the nation, also is facing tax evasion charges after failing to pay the city more than $5,400 in bingo taxes.

Hospital board Chairman William Batts said officials have considered opening a unit for people with sickle-cell anemia, but he acknowledges that the shrinking patient load must improve for Newport News General to survive.

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