Assemblywoman Remains Vigilant After Arrest: 'I Will Not Stop Fighting For LICH'

After a week of protest-related arrests of local politicians and other community members, the battle between SUNY Downstate officials and supporters of struggling Long Island College Hospital has never been more heated.

A day after New York Assemblywoman Joan Millman delivered a petition she started to save LICH bearing more than 7,000 signatures, the local advocate was handcuffed at a march in downtown Brooklyn on Thursday in support of the hospital. But despite these events, Millman remains vigilant in her stance to support the hospital, its employees and those it serves.

"SUNY Downstate has been held in Contempt of Court," she wrote to Patch. "Rallies are held to keep reminding SUNY Officials that the community and the staff of LICH will not stop fighting for LICH."

The assemblywoman was arrested along with two local activists, Dorothy Siegel and Peter Sikora, for blocking pedestrian traffic to the bridge approach at Cadman Plaza, as first reported on by the New York Daily News. But many activists questioned the arrests in the aftermath, as Downstate officials have managed to divert ambulance services and shut down overnight pediatric care recently, despite being under a temporary restraining order barring them from doing so.

"I want to see the ones responsible for ignoring the judge's order to stop diverting ambulances from LICH," wrote Cecilia DiCan on Facebook. "They do not realize how this can affect the quality of medical attention needed to save a life!"

Millman echoed that sentiment in a post on her own Facebook page.

"When one institution closes its doors, patients must go elsewhere," she wrote. "In recent years, my district has seen a surge in new residents. Closing LICH will have a disastrous effect on the neighborhoods LICH serves and pass along a patient burden to an already strained healthcare network. The severe consequences of the LICH ambulance ban are already being witnessed."

SUNY Downstate representative Steve Greenberg told the Daily News that the pediatrics wing was shuttered in the name of “patient safety,” but would not comment on the protest.