Press Release Archives - 596-96 Resignation of Special Advisor

Archives of the Mayor's Press Office

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date: November 19, 1996

Release #596-96

Contact: Colleen Roche (212) 788-2958 or Kate Liebman (212) 788-2888

MAYOR GIULIANI ANNOUNCES RESIGNATION OF MARIA K. MITCHELL AS SPECIAL ADVISOR ON HEALTH POLICY

Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani announced today the resignation of Maria K. Mitchell, RN, MS, PNP, as his Special Advisor for Health Policy and the Chairperson of the $3.2 billion Health & Hospitals Corporation (HHC). Mitchell will continue to serve on a voluntary basis as Chair of the Mayor's Commission to Combat Family Violence. Her resignation will take effect next month.

"Maria Mitchell has done a superb job," Mayor Giuliani said. "She has tackled some the City's most timely, complex, and politically-charged issues, including the largest hospital privatization effort in the nation, the steady expansion of Medicaid managed care, and the advancement of the citywide strategy to combat family violence, which has served as a national model."

Ms. Mitchell will become President of a for-profit entity, the Academic Medicine Development Corporation (AMDC). The AMDC will secure financing for biomedical research, which is at the core of quality health care, and promote the City's biomedical industry which is responsible for more than 32,000 jobs and over $1 billion a year in regional wages and salaries in the New York Metropolitan region.

Under her chairmanship, HHC achieved the first financial surplus in its history through enhanced efficiency and downsizing by over 9,000 corporate staff employees. At the same time, quality of care markedly improved. All facilities achieved accreditation from the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) -- a significant accomplishment in comparison with the period prior to her tenure when six of the fifteen facilities were in jeopardy of losing accreditation.

As a part of a strategic reorganization of HHC, Mitchell has led the City through the largest and most innovative hospital privatization initiative in the nation, transferring control of Coney Island Hospital (CIH) to Primary Health Systems-New York (PHS-NY). The historic agreement, which Mitchell recently negotiated, significantly strengthens and modernizes CIH while ensuring the City's public health safety net, continuing full access for the indigent, improving quality of care for the poor, and saving taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars over the years.

Under Mitchell's leadership, the City's Medicaid managed care program has expanded tenfold from 40,000 enrollees to nearly 400,000, and introduced policies for monitoring and enrollment which safeguard beneficiaries' access to high quality care. As a result, Medicaid recipient access to primary care providers has increased by 500%.

As Chair of Mayor Giuliani's Commission to Combat Family Violence, Mitchell spearheaded the City's family violence strategy. During her chairmanship, planned expansion of domestic violence shelters has increased by more than 45%, innovative new alternatives to allow battered women and children to remain safely in their own homes have been created, and the City launched its first Domestic Violence Public Education Campaign.