Another Restraining Order Filed Against Singing River
Kitty Aguilar had 32 years seniority at S.R.H.S. before she retired in September of 2014. Both her and her husband draw pension checks from the hospital, which represents nearly half their monthly income. Now that Aguilar has been diagnosed with heart disease, she can’t afford for the pension checks to stop. Aguilar says, “It would leave us at a point where I couldn’t afford to receive the healthcare that I need. It would put us in jeopardy of losing our house and our car.”
Wednesday, Aguilar became the fourth person to file a temporary restraining order against the health system. At her hearing in Pascagoula, other hospital retirees filled the benches of the tiny courtroom to show support. During a court recess, some supporters made impassioned speeches about the pension battle. Eddie Manning, a supporter of the retirees, says, “This is highway robbery to y’all. Let’s stand together. Let’s stand together and fight this thing. Don’t let them beat you down.”
The first three restraining order filed against S.R.H.S. have already been removed to federal court, and the fourth one, filed Wednesday, may soon be removed as well. Lawyers for the retirees say this is just a tactic by the health system to create an opportunity for them to terminate the pension plan. Earl Denham, attorney for the retirees, says, “Well, it’s just a lot of shenanigans by the hospital to try to keep the people from seeing the paperwork. It’s really just as simple as that. All we want is that the pension plan be held in place for the benefit of the retirees and to get a looks at the books of the hospital. We wanna’ see every bit of it. We wanna’ see where every dime went that didn’t go into the pension fund, and we’re counting on being able to do that judicially.”
The lawyers for S.R.H.S. were not present at Wednesday’s hearing. Of the four hearings held in chancery court concerning the temporary restraining orders, the hospital lawyers have only attended one. The current restraining order is set to expire January 3rd, 2015.
Wednesday, one of the attorneys representing retirees in the court battle, Harvey Barton, offered advice to current Singing River employees who are considering retirement. He says, “If you retired within three years of November 2011, you’re going to get back only the amount of money that you paid into the plan, plus some pitifully small interest rate, less the amount of money you’ve already withdrawn as a retiree. It’s better for the employees to hang in there, wait awhile, work a little longer. Let’s see if we can work something out.”
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