House Finance committee hears $18M contingency to shore up sale of two safety‑net hospitals

House Finance Committee members spent the evening focused on House Bill 7-408, an administration-backed measure that would place up to $18 million from the state’s supplemental rainy‑day account into a debt service reserve to support the sale of Roger Williams Medical Center and Our Lady of Fatima Hospital.

Sharon, House fiscal staff, summarized the bill’s mechanics: the money would be deposited with the bond trustee as a supplemental reserve for roughly $87 million in revenue bonds Rybeck will issue on behalf of the buyer. The bill explicitly limits the state’s role to the current approved transaction, makes the support contingent on the bonds closing by a specified deadline, and caps the state’s maximum exposure at $18 million.

Why it matters: state officials and hospital leaders said the two hospitals together provide critical services the rest of the system cannot easily absorb. Dr. Jerome Larkin, director of the Department of Health, told the committee the facilities together provide roughly 500 inpatient beds and about 57,000 emergency‑room visits each year and house unique behavioral‑health…