In early March, families learned that St. Michael Medical Center planned to close its pediatric rehabilitation clinic. After weeks without communication, hospital leadership scheduled a meeting with parents.
Families only learned of the meeting when a hospital representative told the Kitsap Public Health Board it had been scheduled. There was no prior outreach to families. Parents had to follow up to confirm it and receive details. This repeated a pattern of no communication and a lack of transparency, where families were left to piece together critical information on their own.
In the end, six parents were invited to attend, representing hundreds of children and families who rely on the clinic for ongoing care. Given the scope of the decision and the number of people affected, that level of access is hard to justify. An open forum would have allowed for genuine community participation and a more transparent exchange of information from the beginning…