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Foxborough residents and regional advocates urge restoration of Norwood Hospital at town meeting comments
Summary
Speakers at the Aug. 19 Select Board meeting urged regional action to restore Norwood Hospital, citing five years without a local hospital, ambulance mutual-aid strain and the need for a state determination of need and interested operators to finish the facility.
During the Select Board’s public-comment period on Aug. 19, Doug Jassett and Jim Garrity of the Save Norwood Hospital effort urged Foxborough residents and officials to support efforts to reopen Norwood Hospital and to attend a Sept. 6 rally on the Norwood Town Common.
Jassett described Norwood Hospital’s pre-storm size and role — “215 beds” and “tens of thousands of visits annually” to its emergency room — and said the facility was flooded in 2020 and has remained out of operation. He told the board that restoring the hospital will require an operator stepping forward, a new determination of need from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, and potentially two years of construction to finish the interior trades.
Garrity offered a personal account of local patient stabilization, saying his father was stabilized at Norwood during an emergency and later moved for surgery — an example cited to illustrate the regional impact of the hospital’s loss.
Speakers estimated the cost to equip an emergency department and hundreds of beds could be in the “couple $100,000,000” range, and they said mutual-aid burdens and ambulance diversions are costing surrounding towns millions annually. Board members raised questions about specific cost estimates and expressed support for regional advocacy to secure an operator and state action.
No formal vote or board action was taken on the hospital; speakers asked the board to publicize the Sept. 6 rally and to coordinate with surrounding elected officials.
Ending: organizers asked residents to spread the word, bring signs and attend the Sept. 6 rally as part of a regional effort to restart Norwood Hospital.
