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BRING BUZZ BACK
Group wants Pishkur to return to Forum Health
The leader of the movement won’t identify any of the others he says are in it.
YOUNGSTOWN — “Bring Buzz Back” is the battle cry of a community-based group that wants to find a local buyer for Forum Health and return Walter “Buzz” Pishkur to his former position as head of the bankrupt health system.
Robert Bernat, group spokesman, claimed the group consists of physicians, community leaders and Forum Health employees — past and present — from both management and union. However, Bernat would not reveal the identity of those in the Bring Buzz Back group.
The group believes local ownership and leadership are in the best interests of Forum employees and the community, he said.
“Many people think that this is Forum’s best chance to survive, and we plan to talk to the board of trustees and attempt to get them to agree and reinstate Buzz,” said Bernat of Canfield.
Bernat is former secretary/treasurer of Teamsters Local 377 and former director of labor relations at Forum in 2008 while Pishkur was chief executive and president.
Pishkur said he is aware of the movement and is interested in returning to his former job to continue the work he started before he was forced out by Forum’s lenders.
“If people want me back, I’d be willing. With the good-faith support of its employees and physicians, the hospital system will work,” Pishkur said Thursday.
Bernat said, “We’re gathering support for Buzz because we realize that when he was CEO he was taking the health system in the right direction.”
And, he said, he thinks that since Pishkur has not been head of Forum, current management is moving toward selling Forum Health.
“Where they are heading is to bring Forum to a point financially where they can say the only possible thing to do is sell it. We are trying to head that off,” Bernat said.
“We [had] believed that in addition to seeking a buyer, which the U.S. Bankruptcy Court mandated, the interim management was going to follow Buzz’s plan and expand the business in Boardman, Hubbard and Newton Falls.”
Expansion into Boardman and Newton Falls has not happened. And management has gone back to employees and demanded additional cuts in wages and benefits, when what really needs to be done is grow the business, not continue to take from those who work there, Bernat said.
He said he thinks that a lot of people believe Forum Health has been ill-run and ill-advised by outside consultants for a long time.
One firm reportedly interested in buying Forum Health is Tennessee-based Ardent Health Services, which a Forum union official recently said is the only suitor that has had discussions with one of Forum’s unions.
Ardent employs 7,700 people and operates seven hospitals in Tennessee, Oklahoma and New Mexico, as well as a physicians group, health plan and laboratory.
Bernat said Ardent came in and told the unions what their wages and benefits would be and that they were non-negotiable. He said Ardent also is known for subcontracting services, which could mean job losses if implemented here.
Bernat said his group’s goal is to get the word out and generate support for its idea of bringing Pishkur back to run Forum.
Anyone interested in joining the effort can call Bernat at (330) 423-8977.
Forum, which filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code in March 2009, operates Northside Medical Center in Youngstown, Trumbull Memorial in Warren and Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital in Howland.
alcorn@vindy.com