Alex Glustrom’s documentary focuses on New Orleans’ Charity Hospital, a healthcare landmark that fell victim to political machinations in the post-Katrina period.
Founded in 1736, Charity Hospital was located at different locations over the years before the 1939 opening of its massive 2,680-bed facility. Originally operated by the Daughters of Charity religious order and celebrating for providing high quality medical care to patients of all races and economic conditions, the hospital was administered by the Louisiana State University (LSU) System in 1997. LSU advocated for a new medical facility in the early 2000s but was unable to obtain state funding. After Hurricane Katrina in 2005 – when the rescue effort to evacuate patients and medical staff was uncommonly lethargic – LSU abruptly shut down Charity Hospital even though the facility had been restored to functioning ability by the U.S. Army.
But Glustrom argues that the closing of Charity Hospital was a politically motivated mistake. A proposal to modernize the existing Charity building, at a cost far below the construction of an expensive new complex, was rejected by LSU, which successfully lobbied to secure FEMA funds to build the brand new facility. Big Charity suggests that LSU played a role in vandalizing the old hospital after the military restored it, and there are interviews with Charity hospital staff that complain of heavy-handed pressure tactics by LSU officials to silence their advocacy of the closed facility, along with input from LSU leaders that deny these charges.
But because there was no appropriate space in New Orleans for the project, eminent domain was used to evict longtime homeowners whose properties were located where LSU wanted its new facility. Thus, the city got a $1.1 billion hospital that it did not need while many residents lost their prized homes.
Today, Charity Hospital is behind barbed wire, an empty shell that haunts the New Orleans skyline. This nonfiction consideration of alleged progress gone awry is a disturbing and haunting production.
Post-script:On January 16, clean-up will be underway on Charity Hospital. LSU Health Sciences Center, which is overseeing the project with the goal of redeveloping and/or repurposing the long-closed property.