St. John’s Hospital receives $740,000 from Queens borough president

Nearly a year and a half after St. John’s Episcopal Hospital in Far Rockaway beat back pressure from the state Department of Health to severely cut services at the only hospital on the Rockaway Peninsula, the healthcare facility received more than $740,000 through Queens borough President Donovan Richards’ office.

Hospital officials said that the money will go to 16 new critical bed systems in the intensive care unit of the cardiac care unit, a new state-of-the art C-arm imaging device to be used in the operating.

Richards was among a group of local Democratic elected officials who met with then Gov. Andrew Cuomo to address their opposition to the state’s plan. St. John’s is a 257-bed hospital that provides emergency and ambulatory care to more than 130,000 people including the Five Towns.

The officials noted that the existing health disparities between Rockaway communities and others across the city, the geographic isolation of the Rockaway Peninsula and increased residential development creating an uptick in the population remain the reasons that the state’s plan should be shelved.